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BURNS' CLARINDA 



Brtet papers concetnino tbe poet's 
IRenowneD Correspondent 



COMPILED BY 

JOHN D.'ROSS, LL.D., 

Author of ''Scottish Poets in America,'' ''A Cluster of Poets,'' etc., etc. 



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2)eMcate& to 

THE OFFICERS AND MExMBERS OF 

THE EDINBURGH BURNS CLUB 

BY 

A SCOT ABROAD WHO IS PROUD OF HIS BEING A 

NATIVE OF THEIR ILLUSTRIOUS CITY. 

rOHN D. ROSS. 



PREFACE 



One of the most pleasing results of the spread 
of the Burns cult is the painstaking manner in 
which the lives and characters of most of those 
who had any influence in shaping his career 
have been investigated and made clear to us. 
Even the lives of those who have been merely 
casually mentioned in his writings have been 
made the object of careful study, until now the 
student of the poet's earthly journey, and of the 
magnificent legacy he bequeathed to Scotland 
and the world, not only understands what manner 
of man he was, but is able to estimate the 
value to him of his mission to the men — and 
the women — with whom he associated in all the 
varied phases of his brief but memorable career. 

As a result of all this scrutiny and investiga- 
tion, which may be said to have started as the 
echoes of the birthday centennial of 1859 began 



Vlll 



Preface. 



to die away, we know much better than Burns 
students did before that year the character of 
the people to whom our country's poet gave his 
friendship, his respect, his admiration, and his 
love. Some have suffered in the fierce light 
which editors and commentators, anxious to 
present to the world something new, have 
brought to bear upon lives which, but for his 
eminence, would long since have passed into 
such utter forgetfulness as not to leave even a 
memory behind. We do not, for instance, think 
so pleasantly now of William Nicol as we did 
when we simply knew him as the brewer of that 
"peck o' maut" which still enlivens many a 
brewing all over the world ; and we have a 
higher regard, now that we have learned more 
about him, for the memory of John Wilson, 
Session Clerk of Tarbolton and afterward school- 
master in Glasgow, than we did when we knew 
him only as the subject of that merciless satire, 
" Death and Dr Hornbook." 

So too with the women who were his 
charmers, his friends, his advisers. Year by 
year the fitness of Bonnie Jean to be his 
life companion has been more acknowledged, 
while the halo of romance with which he has 



Preface. ix 

invested her memory makes her, as the seasons 
roll, take a higher and tenderer place in our 
national literature as an inspirer of song, a 
heroine of poetry. So too, possibly in a more 
marked degree, has been the development of the 
reverence for the memory of " Highland Mary," 
which found its most recent public expression in 
the statue erected last year at Dunoon. 

The present volume deals with another of the 
loves of Burns — the hapless Clarinda. It is safe 
to say that the memory of this gifted but un- 
fortunate woman is held in high esteem for her 
genuine worth more than it was forty years ago. 
Then it was clouded, because people did not 
understand, did not have the means of under- 
standing, her character, her career, or the story 
of her innocent intimacy with the poet. Since 
then her life-story has been searched, been 
weighed, been commented on ; the closest 
scrutiny has been bestowed on her actions, her 
words, her writings, and the most scalpel-like 
dissection has been made even of her thoughts 
as far as they have become recoverable. Out of 
all this she has emerged without a stain, with 
the early cloud rolled away, and with, as her 
only weakness, an acknowledged love for the 
b 



X Preface. 

poet in preference for the heartless scamp who 
wrecked her life. She once hoped that she 
might in time be united to the poet, but she 
never forgot that she was a wedded wife. To 
her faithless husband she remained loyal, to her 
children she was a model mother, and to the 
end of her long life's journey she enjoyed the 
respect of her wide circle of devoted friends. 

This is brought out very clearly in the present 
volume, in which the story of her career is told 
by various writers, and the various incidents in 
that career — notably of course the " Burns 
incident" as it has been called — more or less 
critically analysed. The volume is in reality a 
tribute to the memory of Clarinda. It could 
have been made much larger, its size could have 
been swelled with ease to more stately propor- 
tions, but enough has been presented, I think, 
to demonstrate that among the heroines of 
Burns, Agnes M'Lehose is not the least de- 
serving of honour as an honest, a beautiful, and 
a gifted woman. 

JOHN D. ROSS. 

New York, 
25/// January 1897. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 



Memoir of Mrs M'Lehose, by her Grand- 
son, W. C. M'Lehose . . . i 

Letters to Mrs M'Lehose - - - 37 

Notes on the Clarinda Correspondence, 

BY John Muir, F.S.A. Scot. - - - i33 

Glimpse of Clarinda, by James Adams, M.D., 

Glasgow - - - - - i37 

The Real Clarinda, by Peter Ross, LL.D. 

(Author of " The Scot in America ") - - i6o 

A Tribute, by Prof. John Stuart Blackie - i8i 

All About Clarinda, by Robert Ford - i88 

Clarinda, by Rev. J. C. Higgins, A.M., B.D. - 200 

A Brief Sketch, by Principal Shairp - 207 

Views Concerning Clarinda, by Rev. Dr 

P. Hately Waddell - - - 211 



N 



xii Co7itents. 



PAGE 

A Visit to Clarinda - - - - 219 

Clarinda in Old Age - - - - 223 

The Original Portrait of Clarinda - 225 

Clarinda and Sylvander, by Alex. Smith - 227 

How I Lost the Opportunity of Meeting 

Burns' Clarinda, by Thomas C. Latto - 231 

Burns and Clarinda, by Rev. A. J. Lockhart 236 

The Poet's Immortal Wreath for Clarinda 241 



MEMOIR OF MRS M^LEHOSE. 

BY HER Grandson, 

W. C. M'LEHOSE. 



Memoir of Mrs M'Lehose. 

BY 

Her Grandson, W. C. M'Lehose. 



Mrs M'Lehose, whose maiden name was 
Agnes Craig, was born in Glasgow in April 1759. 
She was the daughter of Mr Andrew Craig, 
surgeon in that city — a gentleman of a good 
family. His brother was the Rev. William 
Craig, one of the ministers of Glasgow, and 
father of Lord Craig, a judge of the Court of 
Session. The mother of Mrs M'Lehose was a 
daughter of the Rev. John M'Laurin, minister of 
Luss, and afterwards of St David's, Glasgow. 
He was a brother of Colin M'Laurin, the cele- 
brated mathematician and friend of Sir Isaac 
Newton. Of the early years of Agnes Craig 
but little is recorded. She was so delicate in 
infancy that it was hardly expected she would 
survive childhood. Yet of the four daughters 
and a son she alone reached old age : all died 
in childhood except her sister Margaret, who, at 



4 Burns' Clarinda. 

the age of nineteen, became the wife of Captain 
Kennedy of Kailzie, and died about a year 
afterwards. The education of Agnes Craig was 
very incomplete, as all female education was 
at that period, compared with the numerous 
advantages possessed by young people of both 
sexes in the present day. All the education 
bestowed upon her was some very imperfect in- 
struction in English grammar, and that laborious 
idleness called sampler-work ; even spelling was 
much neglected. The disadvantages attending 
such an education she afterwards fully perceived, 
and partially remedied at a period of life when 
many women neglect the attainments previously 
acquired, and but few persevere in the cultivation 
of further knowledge. 

Agnes lost her mother when she was only 
eight years old ; and her only surviving sister, 
Mrs Kennedy, dying about five years afterwards, 
she was deprived of that compensation for a 
mother's invaluable influence and superintend- 
ence which might have been derived from an 
elder sister's counsels. Her mother's instruc- 
tions, however, were not lost upon her ; for 
many years afterwards she referred with heart- 
felt gratitude to the benefit she derived from 



Memoir. 5 

the religious principles instilled into her by her 
"sainted mother." 

Henceforward, till her marriage, she lived 
with the father — except that, for half a year, 
when fifteen years old, she was sent to an 
Edinburgh boarding - school — a practice ap- 
parently prevalent in those days as well as 
now — to finish that education which could not 
be said to have been properly begun, and had 
no solid foundation. This circumstance origi- 
nated an acquaintance which ended in her 
marriage. Even at this early age she was 
considered one of the beauties of Glasgow, and 
was styled " the pretty Miss Nancy." Mr James 
M'Lehose, a young man of respectable con- 
nections, and a law agent in that city, had 
been disappointed in getting introduced to her ; 
and when he learned that she was going to 
Edinburgh, he engaged all the seats in the 
stage-coach, excepting the one taken for her. 
At that period the coach took the whole day 
to perform the journey between the two cities, 
stopping a considerable time for dinner on the 
road, which thus afforded Mr M'Lehose an 
excellent opportunity of making himself agree- 
able — an opportunity which he took the utmost 



6 Burns' Clarinda. 

pains to improve, and with success, being pos- 
sessed of an agreeable and attractive person, 
and most insinuating manners. His deficiency 
of sound principle was hidden from general 
observation by great plausibility. After the 
return of " the pretty Miss Nancy " to Glasgow, 
Mr M'Lehose followed up the acquaintance thus 
commenced by paying her the most assiduous 
attention, and thus succeeded in winning her 
affections. Being young and inexperienced, 
deprived of the counsels of a mother and sister, 
and attached to one whom she thought possessed 
of every virtue, and who had shown so decided 
a partiality to her in a manner peculiarly calcu- 
lated to please a romantic mind, she favourably 
received his addresses. 

In this she was not encouraged by her friends, 
who thought that her beauty, talents, and con- 
nections entitled her to a superior match. How- 
ever, she became Mrs M'Lehose in July 1776, 
being then only seventeen years of age, and her 
husband five years her senior. Their union, she 
always stated, was the result of disinterested 
affection on both sides. But this connection 
proved the bane of her happiness and the 
source of all her misfortunes. Married at so 



Memoir. y 

early an age, before the vivacity of youth was 
passed, and indeed before it was fully developed, 
possessed of considerable personal attractions, a 
ready flow of wit, a keen relish for society, in 
which her conversational powers fitted her to 
excel, and a strong love of admiration, she 
appears to have displeased her husband because 
she could not at once forego those enjoyments 
so natural to her time of life and situation. 
And he, without any cause, seems to have con- 
ceived the most unworthy jealousy, which led 
him to treat her with a severity most injudicious, 
and to one of her disposition, productive of the 
worst consequences. 

She soon discovered the mistaken estimate 
she formed of her husband's character ; and 
being of a high sanguine spirit, could ill brook 
the unmerited bad treatment she had received. 
To use her own words, in a statement which 
she afterwards made for the advice of her 
friends — " Only a short time had elapsed ere 
I perceived, with inexpressible regret, that our 
dispositions, tempers, and sentiments were so 
totally different as to banish all hopes of happi- 
ness. Our disagreements rose to such a height, 
and my husband's treatment was so harsh, that 



8 Burns* Clarinda. 

it was thought advisable by my friends a 
separation should take place, which accordingly 
followed in December 1780." 

Mrs M'Lehose had at this period only two 
children living, having lost her first-born. A 
fourth was born a few months after this separa- 
tion. Soon after this event her husband took 
her infant children away from her, in the hopes 
of thereby working on her maternal feelings, 
and forcing a reunion, which she firmly refused, 
being convinced that they could not live happily 
together. She parted with her children with 
extreme reluctance, her father being both able 
and willing to maintain her and them ; while 
her husband had neglected his business, and 
entered into every species of dissipation, so that 
he became unable to maintain his children, and 
they were distributed among his relations — the 
youngest infant being, as soon as possible, re- 
moved from the tender care of his mother, and 
committed to the charge of a hireling nurse. 
He even prohibited her from seeing the children, 
to whom he knew she was devotedly attached. 
It required the utmost fortitude on her part to 
bear this cruel deprivation, but by enduring 
jt she rendered her husband's cruel attempts 



Memoir. 9 

abortive. All the children died young, except 
the late A. C. M'Lehose, W.S. 

Immediately after the separation, she had re- 
turned to her father's house with her children, 
where she remained till his death, in the year 
1782, two years afterwards. He judiciously left 
his property to be invested in an annuity for 
her behoof, entirely independent of her hus- 
band, and beyond his control ; and feeling it 
unpleasant to remain in the same city with her 
husband and his relations, and yet in a state 
of alienation, Mrs M'Lehose, by the advice of 
her friends, removed to Edinburgh in the same 
year, 1782. 

Her husband followed her soon after, on his 
way to London, having formed an intention of 
going abroad. He solicited an interview in 
these terms : " Early to-morrow morning I leave 
this country for ever, and therefore wish much 
to pass one quarter of an hour with you. Upon 
my word of honour, my dearest Nancy, it is 
the last night you probably will ever have an 
opportunity of seeing me in this world." This 
appeal she refused for the following reasons : 
" I consulted my friends : they advised me 
against seeing him ; and as I thought it could 



10 Burns' Clarinda. 

be productive of no good, I declined the inter- 
view." The treatment she received from her 
husband while living with him must have been 
bad indeed to make one of her forgiving dis- 
position so unyielding, and he seems to have 
been not altogether insensible to his misconduct, 
for two years later, and just previous to going 
abroad, he wrote to his wife : " For my own 
part, I am willing to forget what is past ; neither 
do I require any apology from you ; for I am 
heartily sorry for those instances of my behaviour 
to you which caused our separation. Were it 
possible to recall them, they should never be 
repeated." These feelings may have been sin- 
cere at the moment, but they had no depth or 
endurance. 

Soon after Mr M'Lehose went to London, in 
the year 1782 he wrote his wife a very reproachful 
letter, stating his intention of going abroad, and 
bidding her take her children home to her. In 
this letter he observed : " The sooner you return 
to Glasgow the better, and take under your care 
and protection those endearing pledges of our 
once-happier days, as none of my friends will 
have anything to do with them." After speaking 
of his prospects of employment, he added : " Yet 



Memoir. 1 1 

still, however remote my residence may be from 
you and those endearing infants, God forbid that 
I should be so destitute of natural affection for 
them, as to permit you or them, in the smallest 
degree, to be burdensome to any of your friends. 
On the contrary, I shall at all times observe the 
strictest economy, and exert myself to the utter- 
most, so that I may be enabled to contribute to 
your ease and happiness." 

It will be seen in the sequel how this fair 
promise was observed. The truth is that as he 
could not prevail on his wife to live with him, 
even by depriving her of her children, to whom 
she was tenderly attached, and his relations 
would no longer support him in his idleness, 
or his children for his sake, their sympathy for 
him being blunted, if not deadened, by his mis- 
conduct, he thus contrived to throw the burden 
of them on his young wife, whose patrimonial 
income was very limited. Her situation at this 
trying period is thus related : " The income left 
me by my father being barely sufficient to board 
myself, I was now distressed how to support 
my three infants. With my spirits sunk in 
deep dejection, I went to Glasgow to see them. 
I found arrears due for their board. This I 



12 Burns' Clarinda. 

paid ; and the goodness of some worthy gentle- 
men in Glasgow procuring me a small annuity 
from the writers, and one from the surgeons, 
I again set out for Edinburgh with them in 
August 1782 ; and by the strictest economy, 
made my little income go as far as possible. 
The deficiency was always supplied by some 
worthy benevolent friends, whose kindness no 
time can erase from my grateful heart." 

When Mrs M'Lehose settled in Edinburgh 
in 1782, though comparatively a stranger, her 
youth, beauty, and misfortunes, and above all, 
her exemplary conduct, procured for her the 
friendship, not only of her own relations, but of 
many respectable families, till then unknown to 
her, from whom she received many substantial 
proofs of kindness. Thus, though deprived of 
his assistance to whom she had the most sacred 
claim, she had much reason to bless God for 
His goodness in raising up so many friends. 
Among these friends, Lord Craig, her cousin- 
german, then an advocate at the Scottish bar, 
is particularly deserving of mention. He be- 
friended her from her first arrival in Edinburgh, 
and continued, during his life, her greatest 
benefactor. Mrs M'Lehose consulted him on 



Memoir. 1 3 

all occasions of difficulty ; and when deprived 
of the annuities from Glasgow, soon after her 
husband settled in Jamaica, on account of his 
ability to maintain his children himself, Lord 
Craig generously continued them, and made up 
the deficiencies of her income. At his death 
he left her an annuity, and made her son 
residuary legatee. Besides these substantial 
acts of kindness, she enjoyed his friendship, 
and was a frequent visitor at his house, where 
the best literary society of Edinburgh used to 
assemble. During Mrs M'Lehose's early resi- 
dence in Edinburgh, when she had not joined 
that social circle of which she soon became an 
ornament, she devoted much time and attention 
to remedying the defects of her early educa- 
tion. She improved her taste by the study of 
the best English authors, and became profi- 
cient in English composition. Possessed of a 
most retentive memory, she often quoted aptly 
from those authors, both in conversation and in 
her correspondence, which afterwards became 
extensive, and in which she excelled. It is to 
be regretted that so little of that correspond- 
ence has been preserved ; but Mrs M'Lehose 
having survived nearly all the friends of her 



14 Biirns^ Clarinda. 

early life, applications made in quarters where it 
was supposed her letters might have been pre- 
served, have been unsuccessful. 

It was at this period also that Mrs M'Lehose 
began cultivating the Muses. She produced 
many short poetical effusions, a few of which have 
been preserved. Her earliest composition was 
an " Address to a Blackbird," which she heard 
singing on a tree near her residence, in the 
neighbourhood of a spot where St Margaret's 
Convent has since been placed. The ideas, 
she stated, came into her mind like inspiration. 

In the rearing and education of her children 
she took great delight ; and the society of the 
many friends she acquired yielded her constant 
enjoyment for a long series of years, until the 
progress of time thinned their ranks, and in- 
creasing years and infirmities made her, in some 
degree, willing to relinquish social intercourse, 
of which she was so fond, for the retirement 
befitting old age. Among the literary men 
who used to visit her, Thomas Campbell, who 
was then prosecuting his studies at the Univer- 
sity ; the amiable Graham, the author of " The 
Sabbath " ; James Gray, author of " Cuna of 
Cheyd," and "The Sabbath among the Moun- 



Memoir. 1 5 

tains " ; and Robert Ainslie, the friend of Burns, 
author of various religious works addressed to 
the young, and of a series of political letters, 
may be enumerated. This gentleman proved 
throughout life a warm and steady friend. He 
was an original visitor at Mrs M'Lehose's New 
Year parties, which were kept up for about 
forty years, and are still remembered by several 
of the younger guests for their great convivi- 
ality, to which the liveliness and vivacity of the 
hostess greatly contributed. 

Toward the end of the year 1787, Robert 
Burns was introduced to Mrs M'Lehose in the 
house of a mutual friend. Miss Nimmo. They 
spent the evening together ; and we have the 
sentiments recorded by both parties of the im- 
pressions reciprocally produced. The poet de- 
clared, in one of his letters to her : " Of all God's 
creatures I ever could approach in the beaten 
way of friendship, you struck me with the 
deepest, the strongest, the most permanent 
impression." While she wrote : " Miss Nimmo 
can tell you how earnestly I had long pressed 
her to make us acquainted. I had a presenti- 
ment that we would derive pleasure from the 
society of each other." The poet was at this 



1 6 Bicrns* Clarinda. 

time preparing to depart from Edinburgh ; and 
under these circumstances, could only regret 
that he had not possessed the opportunity of 
cultivating the lady's acquaintance earlier; but 
a severe accident, which happened a day or two 
later, when he was engaged to spend the even- 
ing with her, delayed his departure for some 
time, and led to a correspondence in which 
Mrs M'Lehose fancifully adopted the name of 
" Clarinda," and Burns followed up the idea by 
signing " Sylvander." As soon as he recovered 
from his accident, the poet visited the lady, and 
they enjoyed much of each other's society for 
several months till he left Edinburgh. They 
met only once afterwards, in the year 1791, 
but occasionally corresponded till within a short 
period of his death. 

When Mr M'Lehose went to London in 
1782, he found too many opportunities for in- 
dulging in dissipation and extravagance to go 
abroad so long as he was able to procure money 
from his family in Scotland — assistance which 
they could ill afford, and were obliged finally 
to refuse, their patience and generosity being 
exhausted. After two years and a half thus 
spent in idleness, Mr M'Lehose was thrown 



Memoir. \y 

into prison for debt ; and his relatives, being 
once more appealed to, consented to advance 
the funds necessary for his release and outfit, 
on condition that he immediately went abroad. 
With this he complied, and sailed for Jamaica 
in November 1784. Before leaving London, 
and afterwards from Jamaica, where he became 
very prosperous, he wrote his mother and 
family most grateful letters for their kindness, 
but never repaid the debt, though appealed 
to, when his mother's income became inade- 
quate to her support. 

Mr M'Lehose did not favour his wife even 
with grateful letters, though she wrote him re- 
peatedly respecting her circumstances and the 
health of their children. The following appeal 
to him from Lord Craig was equally fruitless : 
" I write you this letter to represent to you 
the situation of your family here. Your wife's 
father left some property in Glasgow, the in- 
terest of which your wife draws for the support 
of herself and children ; but this not being 
sufficient, by the solicitation of some of your 
friends ^8 a year was obtained from the sur- 
geons, and £\o a year from the writers in 
Glasgow. Even this, however, did not do, 
B 



1 8 Burns' Clarinda. 

owing to the great rise in the expense of 
housekeeping, and the necessary outlay for 
your children and their education ; so that I 
advanced money to Mrs M. even while she 
got the above sums. Accounts, I am informed, 
have lately arrived from Jamaica which I am 
very glad of, representing you to be in a very 
good situation, and as having got into very 
profitable business. The surgeons and writers 
have withdrawn their allowance, and I have 
been told their principal reason for doing so is 
the accounts they have heard of the goodness 
of your situation. No remittances, however, 
have as yet come from you ; and in this last 
year, owing to the withdrawal of the writers 
and surgeons, I have paid Mrs M'Lehose 
upwards of £'^0 above what I have received. 
No person, except my brother, is willing to 
contribute anything ; and all your own relations 
have positively refused, from the beginning, to 
contribute a single farthing. In this situation 
I am resolved to advance no more money out 
of my own funds on the account of your family. 
What I have already given, I have never laid 
my account in being reimbursed, and it shall 
never be thought of; but for the future every 



MetJioir. 19 

consideration demands that you should yourself 
contribute for the support of your own chil- 
dren. I expect, therefore, that you will by the 
first opportunity write to some of your corre- 
spondents in this country, giving what direc- 
tions you think proper about your children, 
and making some proper remittance on their 
account, as, I repeat it again, I am deter- 
mined not to continue to pay money on their 
account." 

In Mrs M'Lehose's narrative she states : 
" About the year 1787, my youngest boy, 
William, fell into ill-health. This increased 
my expense ; and at this period the annuities 
from Glasgow were withheld from me, the 
reason assigned being that Mr M'Lehose was 
doing well, and in a way to support his chil- 
dren himself I wrote once more to him, 
giving him an account of his children, par- 
ticularly of William's helpless situation, and 
also my reduced circumstances, warmly expos- 
tulating with him on the duty and necessity 
of remitting for their support and education. 
I anxiously waited for an answer, but received 
none. In August 1788 my delicate child was 
happily delivered from his sufferings. I wrote 



20 Burns' Clarmda. 

again immediately of his death. Still I received 
no answer till the following August, when I 
had a letter, and soon after another, inviting 
me to come to Jamaica, and enclosing a bill 
for ;6^50, which was meant, I suppose, to equip 
me, and containing the most flattering direc- 
tions to give his only surviving son the best 
education Edinburgh would afford." " With 
regard to my dear son," Mr M'Lehose writes, 
" it is my wish that he should be placed in 
the first boarding-school for young gentlemen, 
either in Edinburgh or its environs. Whatever 
expense may attend it shall be regularly and 
punctually paid. It is my wish that he should 
continue at the Latin until he is perfect master 
of that language; and when that is accom- 
plished, I wish him to be instructed in the 
French, which is now become so generally use- 
ful all over the globe, and in particular here, 
where I intend to fix him in business. It will 
be proper also that he be immediately put 
under a dancing-master, and, what is still more 
requisite, that he should learn to fence. No 
expense can be incurred that will not be dis- 
charged with infinite pleasure and satisfaction, 
provided he is to benefit by it as I could wish. 



Memoir. 1 1 

If you have no inclination to come out to this 
country, I then have to request you to embrace 
the first opportunity to inform me of such deter- 
mination, as in that case I will immediately 
order my son up to London, and put him 
under the care of one of the first West India 
houses in the city to receive the remainder of 
his education either at Westminster or at Eton, 
whichever they think most advisable." 

Mrs M'Lehose was much at a loss how to act. 
At first she felt strongly inclined to remain in 
this country, but finally resolved to proceed to 
Jamaica. " I consulted my friends ; they de- 
clined giving any advice, and referred me to my 
own mind. After much agitation, and deep and 
anxious reflection for my only child's sake, for 
whom he promised such liberal things, and 
encouraged by flattering accounts of his charac- 
ter and conduct in Jamaica, I resolved to under- 
take the arduous voyage." 

The motives which influenced her will best 
be seen from the letter which she wrote to her 
friend, Lord Craig, upon the subject : " When I 
last wrote you, the bidding adieu to my dear 
boy was my only source of anxiety. I had then 
no idea whatever of going out to Mr M'Lehose. 



22 Burns'^ Clarinda.' 

Next day I learned from Mrs Adair that Captain 
Liddel told her my husband had the strongest 
resolution of using me kindly, in case I accepted 
of his invitation ; and that pride alone hindered 
his acknowledging his faults a second time, still 
hurt at my not answering his overtures of recon- 
ciliation from London. But that, in case I did 
not choose to come over, I might rest assured 
I never would hear from him while he existed. 
Captain Liddel added his opinion, that I ought 
to go, in the strongest terms. Mrs Adair joins 
him ; and above all, my poor son adds his 
entreaties most earnestly. I thought it prudent 
to inform him, for the first time, of the disagree- 
ment between his parents, and the unhappy 
jealousy in his father's temper. Still he argues 
that his father may be incensed at my refusal. 
If I go, I have a terror of the sea, and no less of 
the climate ; above all, the horror of again 
involving myself in misery in the midst of 
strangers, and almost without remedy. If I 
refuse, I must bid my only child (in whom all 
affections and hopes are entirely centred) adieu 
for ever : struggle with a straitened income and 
the world's censure solitary and unprotected. 
The bright side of these alternatives is, that if 



Memoir. 23 

I go my husband's jealousy of temper may be 
abated, from a better knowledge of the world ; 
and time and misfortunes, by making alterations 
both on person and vivacity, will render me 
less likely to incur his suspicions ; and that ill 
humour, which partly arose from straitened 
fortune, will be removed by affluence. I will 
enjoy my son's society, and have him for a 
friend ; and who knows what effect so fine a boy 
may have on a father long absent from his sight. 
If I refuse, and stay here, I shall continue to 
enjoy a circle of kind, respectable friends. 
Though my income be small, I can never be in 
want, and I shall maintain that liberty which, 
after nine years' enjoyment, I shall find it hard 
to forego, even to the degree to which I am 
sensible every married woman must submit." 

A few days later she wrote again to the same 
gentleman : " On Friday last I went down to 
Leith, and had a conversation on board the 
'Roselle' with Captain Liddel. He told me that 
Mr M'Lehose had talked of me, and of my 
coming over, with great tenderness ; and said it 
would be my fault if we did not enjoy great 
happiness ; and concluded with assuring me, if 
I were his own child he would advise me to go 



24 Burns' Clarinda. 

out. This conversation has tended greatly to 
decide my accepting my husband's invitation. 
I have done what you desired me — weighed 
coolly (as coolly as a subject so interesting 
would permit) all I have to suffer or expect in 
either situation ; and the result is, my going to 
Jamaica. This appears to me the preferable 
choice ; it is surely the path of duty ; and such, 
I may look for the blessing of God to attend my 
endeavours for happiness with him who was the 
husband of my choice and the father of my 
children. On Saturday I was agreeably surprised 
by a call from Mr Kemp. He had received my 
letter that morning at Glasgow, and had alighted 
for a few minutes, on his way to Easter Dudding- 
ston, where his family are for summer quarters. 
He was much affected with my perplexing situa- 
tion. Like you, he knew not how to decide, 
and left me, promising to call early this day, 
which he has done. I told him of the meeting 
with Mr Liddel, and enumerated all the argu- 
ments which I had thought of on both sides of 
the question. What Mr Liddel (who is a man 
of known worth) said to me weighed much with 
him ; and he, too, is now of opinion my going to 
Jamaica is advisable. He gave me much good 



Memoir. 25 

advice as to my conduct towards Mr M'Lehose, 
and promised to write him himself. Your letter 
luckily arrived while he was with me. The 
assurance of my little income being secured me 
not a little adds both to his opinion of the 
propriety of my going, and to my ease and 
comfort, in case (after doing all I can) it should 
prove impossible to enjoy that peace which I so 
earnestly pant after ; and I would fain hope for 
a tender reception. After ten years' separation, 
and the sacrifice I make bidding adieu (probably 
for ever) to my friends and my country — indeed, 
I am much depressed in mind — should I escape 
the sea, the climate may prove fatal to me ; but 
should it happen so, I have the satisfaction to 
think I shall die in attempting to attain happi- 
ness in that path of duty which Providence and 
a succession of events seem to point out for the 
best. You, my dear kind benefactor, have had 
much trouble with me first and last ; and though 
others appear ungrateful, neither time nor 
absence can ever erase from my heart the re- 
membrance of your past kindness. My prayers 
shall ascend for the reward of Heaven upon your 
head. To-morrow I am to write to my husband. 
Mr Kemp is to see it on Wednesday. If any 



26 Burns' Clarinda. 

person occurs to you as proper to place Andrew 
with in Edinburgh, let me know — the sooner 
the better : the hopes of his rejoining me will help 
to console my mind in the midst of strangers. 
I am sorry you are to be so long of coming to 
town. Meantime I shall be glad to hear from 
you : for I am, my dear Sir, in every possible 
situation, your affectionate and obliged friend, 
A. M." 

" I accordingly wrote my husband in October 
1791, acquainting him with my resolution of 
forgetting past differences, and throwing myself 
on his protection." As the " Roselle " did not 
leave for Jamaica till spring, she again wrote him 
in December. 

After giving the details of the arrangements 
she had made for their son's education, in com- 
pliance with his instructions, she thus proceeds : 
" I had occasion to be in Glasgow lately for 
two days only. I called for your mother. I felt 
much for her — bereaved of so many children. 
The peculiar circumstances which attended poor 
Annie's death affected me excessively. They 
told me you had not written these three years 
past ; but I assured them (and I hope it is the 
case) that your letters must have miscarried, as 



Memoir. 27 

I could not believe you capable of such unkind 
neglect. I am certain, inclination, no less than 
duty, must ever prompt you to pay attention to 
your mother. She has met with many and sore 
afflictions, and I feel for her the most sincere 
sympathy." In the same letter she adds : " I 
have met with much kindness since I came to 
Edinburgh, from a set of most agreeable and 
respectable friends. No ideas of wealth or 
splendour could compensate for the pain I shall 
feel in bidding them adieu. Nothing could 
support me but the fond reliance I have of gain- 
ing your affections and confidence. To possess 
these is the dearest wish of my heart, and I 
trust the Almighty will grant this my ardent 
desire. I would fain hope to hear from you ere 
I sail ; a kind letter from you would prove a 
balm to my soul during the anxieties of a 
tedious voyage." 

Mrs M'Lehose sailed from Leith in February 
1792, and arrived at Kingston in April following. 
The day before her departure she received a 
letter from her fickle husband, dissuading her 
from going out, on the pretence that the yellow 
fever prevailed in the island, and that a revolt 
had taken place among the negroes ; both of 



2S Burns^ Clarinda. 

which statements were false. But having taken 
leave of her friends, engaged her passage, and 
made the preparations which the expectation of 
an absence, prolonged perhaps for years, required, 
she resolved (unwisely, as the event proved) to 
proceed. It is a curious coincidence that the 
vessel she sailed in was the " Roselle," the same 
in which Burns intended to have sailed for the 
same destination a few years earlier. 

Mrs M'Lehose suffered much from the voyage, 
especially in the warmer latitudes, and when she 
reached Kingston, her husband did not go down 
to the ship for a length of time. All the other 
lady passengers had been speedily joined by 
their friends. When he came, he was very cold, 
and seemed far from being glad to see his wife ; 
and even in this interview, before they left the 
ship, he used some harsh expressions towards 
her in presence of the captain and others which 
wounded her feelings much. 

" As my constitution never agreed with heat, 
I felt its bad effects as soon as we had crossed 
the Line ; but the very cold reception I received 
from Mr M'Lehose on landing, gave me a shock 
which, joined to the climate, deranged my mind 
to such a degree as made me not answerable for 



Memoir. 29 

what I either said or did. My husband's after- 
kindness could not remove the complication of 
nervous disorders which seized me. They 
increased to such a height that Dr Fife, the 
professional gentleman who attended me, and 
whose soothing manner I can never forget, was 
of opinion my going home was absolutely 
necessary — otherwise my reason, if not my life, 
would fall a sacrifice. Accordingly, in June I 
took leave of Mr M'Lehose, and returned home 
in the ship I had gone out in. Our parting 
was most affectionate. On my part, it was with 
sincere regret that my health obliged me to 
leave him. Upon his, it was to all appearance 
equally so. However, we parted with mutual 
promises of constancy, and of keeping up a 
regular correspondence. After getting into cool 
air, I gradually recovered my health." 

There were other reasons for leaving Jamaica 
besides those which she mentioned in the state- 
ment just quoted. Mr M'Lehose, like most 
West Indian planters, had a family by a coloured 
mistress. This could not be otherwise than a 
source of mortification and annoyance. The 
ebullition of temper which he had exhibited 
towards her on their first meeting was a prelude 



30 Burns^ Clarinda. 

to more violent outbreaks, which, though not 
always directed to her personally, paralysed her 
with fear. His slaves were generally the objects 
of these fits of wrath ; and seeing that his wife 
pitied their abject condition, he took pleasure in 
threatening and abusing them in her presence. 

Circumstances were thus most unfavourable to 
Mrs M'Lehose's stay in Jamaica ; but, had they 
been propitious, she was ill calculated to endure 
a permanent change of habits. That she was 
undoubtedly very unhappy in the West Indies 
may be gathered from the following extract from 
her journal many years afterwards : " Recollect 
that I arrived in Jamaica this day twenty-two 
years. What I suffered during the three months 
I remained there, Lord, make me grateful for Thy 
goodness in bringing me back to my native 
country." 

Mrs M'Lehose arrived in Edinburgh in August 
1792, and soon after resumed housekeeping, and 
took home her son, who had been placed at Dr 
Chapman's excellent boarding-school. The first 
year had now expired without any part of the 
expense being defrayed by his father, and the 
debt was ultimately cancelled by the liberality 
of Lord Craig. As Mr M'Lehose continued 



Memoir. 3 1 

thus utterly to neglect his wife and son, she was 
prevailed on by her friends to institute proceed- 
ings against him before the Court of Session in 
order to enforce these obligations. In March 
1797, accordingly, she obtained a judgment of 
the Court, ordaining him to pay her a yearly 
aliment of ;^ioo sterling. From that judgment 
the following is an extract : "In the close of the 
year 1784, Mr M'Lehose settled as an attorney- 
at-law in Kingston, Jamaica ; and business in- 
creased so rapidly, that he was soon in posses- 
sion of, and still enjoys, a revenue of ;^ 1,000 a 
j/ear from his profession." 

This decree, however, owing to Mr M'Lehose 
being resident in Jamaica, did not add to Mrs 
M'Lehose's income ; although it was the means 
ultimately of enabling her to recover in this 
country some funds belonging to her husband. 
Thus abandoned by her husband, Mrs M*Lehose 
and her only son, the late Mr Andrew M'Lehose, 
W.S., continued to live together. Soon after her 
return from Jamaica, Mr Robert Ainslie, the 
friend of Burns, kindly took her son as appren- 
tice. He continued to live with his mother until 
the year 1809, when he married. They lived 
most happily together ; and probably there have 



32 Burns' Clarinda. 

been few instances of more devoted mutual 
attachment between parent and child. 

In March 1812, Mr M'Lehose died at King- 
ston ; and though he had been in receipt of a 
large income for many years as Chief Clerk of 
the Court of Common Pleas in Jamaica, no funds 
were ever received from that island by his family. 
A report reached this country, as being a matter 
of notoriety in Kingston, that some of his par- 
ticular friends had, on the approach of death, 
sent all his domestics out of the house, and as 
soon as the breath quitted his body, carried off 
whatever cash and documents there were. If so, 
the friends proved befitting the man. Notice, 
however, was given to Mrs M'Lehose that a 
balance of several hundred pounds, belonging to 
her husband, was in the hands of Messrs Coutts 
in London, which she soon afterwards obtained. 

It was then discovered that he had had an 
account current at this bank for many years, 
while he had suffered his family to have their 
income eked out by the generosity of friends : 
;^50 advanced to her, as already mentioned, 
before she sailed for Jamaica, and a present of 
;^2i on leaving that island, being all which this 
wealthy husband bestowed on his family in the 



Memoir. 3J 

long period of thirty-two years. Yet, after her 
departure from Jamaica, he was in the habit of 
speaking of his family with great affection, and 
boasted of the valuable presents which he had 
made his wife and son. It is known that he was 
a man of talents and pleasing address, but his 
temper was occasionally violent and ungovern- 
able. Yet he was often soft and agreeable. His 
written correspondence showed the same charac- 
teristics — alternate passages of the most endear- 
ing and the most insulting language. 



LETTERS TO MRS M'LEHOSE, 



Letters to Mrs M'Lehose. 



No. I. 
To Mrs M'Lehose. 

Tuesday Eve?img {December 6, 1787]. 

Madam, 

I had set no small store by my tea- 
drinking to-night, and have not often been so 
disappointed. Saturday evening I shall embrace 
the opportunity with the greatest pleasure. I 
leave town this day sennight, and probably for 
a couple of twelvemonths ; but must ever regret 
that I so lately got an acquaintance I shall 
ever highly esteem, and in whose welfare I shall 
ever be warmly interested. 

Our worthy common friend, in her usual 
pleasant way, rallied me a good deal on my 
new acquaintance, and in the humour of her 
ideas I wrote some lines, which I enclose you, 



38 Burns' Clarinda, 

as I think they have a good deal of poetic 
merit; and Miss [Nimmo] tells me you are 
not only a critic, but a poetess. Fiction, you 
know, is the native region of poetry ; and I 
hope you will pardon my vanity in sending 
you the bagatelle as a tolerable off-hand jeu 
d'esprit. I have several poetic trifles, which I 
will gladly leave with Miss [Nimmo] or you, if 
they were worth house-room ; as there are 
scarcely two people on earth by whom it would 
mortify me more to be forgotten, though at 
the distance of ninescore miles. 

I am, Madam, with the highest respect. 

Your very humble Servant, 

"k ^ ^ ^ 



No. II. 
To Mrs M'Lehose. 

Saturday Even \I)eceinber 8]. 

I CAN say with truth, Madam, that I never 

met with a person in my life whom I more 

anxiously wished to meet again than yourself 

To-night I was to have had that very great 



Letters. 39 

pleasure — I was intoxicated with the idea ; but 
an unlucky fall from a coach has so bruised 
one of my knees, that I can't stir my leg off 
the cushion. So, if I don't see you again, I 
shall not rest in my grave for chagrin. I was 
vexed to the soul I had not seen you sooner. 
I determined to cultivate your friendship with 
the enthusiasm of religion ; but thus has For- 
tune ever served me. I cannot bear the idea 
of leaving Edinburgh without seeing you. I 
know not how to account for it — I am strangely 
taken with some people, nor am I often mis- 
taken. You are a stranger to me ; but I am an 
odd being. Some yet unnamed feelings — things, 
not principles, but better than whims — carry 
me farther than boasted reason ever did a 
philosopher. 

Farewell ! every happiness be yours. 

Robert Burns. 



No. III. 
To Mrs M'Lehose. 

I STRETCH a point indeed, my dearest Madam, 
when I answer your card on the rack of my 



40 Burns' Clarinda. 

present agony. Your friendship, Madam ! By 
heavens, I was never proud before ! Your lines, 
I maintain it, are poetry, and good poetry; 
mine were indeed partly fiction, and partly a 
friendship which, had I been so blest as to 
have met with you in time, might have led me 
— God of love only knows where. Time is too 
short for ceremonies. 

I swear solemnly (in all the tenor of my 
former oath) to remember you in all the pride 
and warmth of friendship until — I cease to be ! 

To-morrow, and every day, till I see you, you 
shall hear from me. 

Farewell ! May you enjoy a better night's 
repose than I am likely to have ! 



No. IV. 

To Mrs M'Lehose. 

Your last, my dear Madam, had the effect on 
me that Job's situation had on his friends, when 
" they sat down seven days and seven nights 
astonied, and spake not a word." " Pay my 
addresses to a married woman ! " I started as 
if I had seen the ghost of him I had injured : 



Letters. 41 

I recollected my expressions ; some of them 
indeed were, in the law phrase, "habit and 
repute," which is being half guilty. I cannot 
positively say. Madam, whether my heart might 
not have gone astray a little ; but I can declare, 
upon the honour of a poet, that the vagrant has 
wandered unknown to me. I have a pretty 
handsome troop of follies of my own ; and, like 
some other people's retinue, they are but un- 
disciplined blackguards ; but the luckless rascals 
have something of honour in them : they would 
not do a dishonest thing. 

To meet with an unfortunate woman, amiable 
and young, deserted and widowed by those who 
were bound by every tie of duty, nature, and 
gratitude to protect, comfort, and cherish her ; 
add to all, when she is perhaps one of the first 
of lovely forms and noble minds, the mind, too, 
that hits one's taste as the joys of heaven do 
a saint — should a vague infant idea, the natural 
child of imagination, thoughtlessly peep over 
the fence — were you, my friend, to sit in judg- 
ment, and the poor, airy straggler brought 
before you, trembling, self-condemned, with 
artless eyes, brimful of contrition, looking wist- 
fully on its judge, you could not, my dear 



42 Burns' Clarinda, 

Madam, condemn the hapless wretch to death 
" without benefit of clergy " ? 

I won't tell you what reply my heart made 
to your raillery of " seven years " : but I will 
give you what a brother of my trade says on 
the same allusion : — 

" The Patriarch to gain a wife, 
Chaste, beautiful and young, 
Served fourteen years a painful life, 
And never thought it long. 

" Oh, were you to reward such cares. 
And life so long would stay. 
Not fourteen but four hundred years 
Would seem as but one day." 

I have written you this scrawl because I have 
nothing else to do, and you may sit down and 
find fault with it, if you have no better way of 
consuming your time ; but finding fault with 
the vagaries of a poet's fancy is much such 
another business as Xerxes chastising the waves 
of the Hellespont. 

My limb now allows me to sit in some peace : 
to walk I have yet no prospect of, as I can't 
mark it to the ground. 

I have just now looked over what I have 
written, and it is such a chaos of nonsense that 



Letters. 43 

I daresay you will throw it into the fire, and call 
me an idle, stupid fellow ; but whatever you may 
think of my brains, believe me to be, with the 
most sacred respect and heartfelt esteem. 

My dear Madam, your humble Servant, 

Robert Burns. 

No. V. 

To Clarinda. 

Friday Evetting {December 21]. 
I BEG your pardon, my dear " Clarinda," for 
the fragment scrawl I sent you yesterday. I 
really do not know what I wrote. A gentleman 
for whose character, abilities, and critical know- 
ledge I have the highest veneration, called in 
just as I had begun the second sentence, and I 
would not make the porter wait. I read to my 
much-respected friend several of my own baga- 
telles, and, among others, your lines, which I 
had copied out. He began some criticisms on 
them as on the other pieces, when I informed 
him they were the work of a young lady in this 
town, which, I assure you, made him stare. My 
learned friend seriously protested that he did 



44 Burns^ Clarinda. 

not believe any young woman in Edinburgh 
was capable of such lines ; and if you know 
anything of Professor Gregory, you will neither 
doubt of his abilities nor his sincerity. I do 
love you, if possible, still better for having so 
fine a taste and turn for poesy. I have again 
gone wrong in my usual unguarded way, but 
you may erase the word, and put esteem, respect, 
or any other tame Dutch expression you please 
in its place. I believe there is no holding con- 
verse, or carrying on correspondence, with an 
amiable woman, much less a gloriously amiable 
fine wonian^ without some mixture of that 
delicious passion whose most devoted slave I 
have more than once had the honour of being. 
But why be hurt or offended on that account ? 
Can no honest man have a prepossession for a 
fine woman, but he must run his head against 
an intrigue ? Take a little of the tender witch- 
craft of love, and add to it the generous, the 
honourable sentiments of manly friendship, and 
I know but one more delightful morsel, which 
few, few in any rank ever taste. Such a com- 
position is like adding cream to strawberries : 
it not only gives the fruit a more elegant rich- 
ness, but has a peculiar deliciousness of its own. 



Letters. 45 

I enclose you a few lines I composed on a late 
melancholy occasion.* I will not give above 
five or six copies of it at all, and I would be 
hurt if any friend should give any copies without 
my consent. 

You cannot imagine, Clarinda (I like the idea 
of Arcadian names in a commerce of this kind), 
how much store I have set by the hopes of your 
future friendship. I do not know if you have 
a just idea of my character, but I wish you to 
see me as I am. I am, as most people of my 
trade are, a strange Will-o'-wisp being ; the 
victim, too frequently, of much imprudence and 
many follies. My great constituent elements are 
pride and passion. The first I have endeavoured 
to humanise into integrity and honour ; the 
last makes me a devotee to the warmest degree 
of enthusiasm in love, religion, or friendship — 
either of them, or all together, as I happen to be 
inspired. 'Tis true I never saw you but once ; 
but how much acquaintance did I form with you 
in that once ! Do not think I flatter you, or 
have a design upon you, Clarinda : I have too 



* Probably the verses on the Death of the Lord Pre- 
sident. 



4^ Burns' Clarinda. 

much pride for the one, and too Httle cold 
contrivance for the other ; but of all God's 
creatures I ever could approach in the beaten 
way of my acquaintance, you struck me with the 
deepest, the strongest, the most permanent im- 
pression. I say the most permanent, because I 
know myself well, and how far I can promise 
either in my prepossessions or powers. Why 
are you unhappy? And why are so many of 
our fellow-creatures, unworthy to belong to the 
same species with you, blest with all they can 
wish ? You have a hand all benevolent to give : 
why were you denied the pleasure ? You have 
a heart formed — gloriously formed — for all the 
most refined luxuries of love : why was that 
heart ever wrung ? Oh Clarinda ! shall we not 
meet in a state, some yet unknown state of 
being, where the lavish hand of plenty shall 
minister to the highest wish of benevolence, and 
where the chill north wind of prudence shall 
never blow over the flowery fields of enjoyment ? 
If we do not, man was made in vain ! I deserve 
most of the unhappy hours that have lingered 
over my head ; they were the wages of my 
labour : but what unprovoked demon, malignant 
as hell, stole upon the confidence of unmistrust- 



Letters. 47 

ing busy fate, and dashed your cup of life with 

undeserved sorrow ? 

Let me know how long your stay will be out 

of town ; I shall count the hours till you inform 

me of your return. Cursed etiquette forbids your 

seeing me just now ; and so soon as I can walk 

I must bid Edinburgh adieu. Lord ! why was I 

born to see misery which I cannot relieve, and 

to meet with friends whom I cannot enjoy ? I 

look back with the pang of unavailing avarice 

on my loss in not knowing you sooner : all last 

winter, these three months past, what luxury of 

intercourse have I not lost! Perhaps, though, 

'twas better for my peace. You see I am either 

above or incapable of dissimulation. I believe 

it is want of that particular genius. I despise 

design, because I want either coolness or wisdom 

to be capable of it. I am interrupted. Adieu, 

my dear Clarinda ! 

Sylvander. 

No. VI. 

To Clarinda. 

My dear Clarinda, 

Your last verses have so delighted me, that 
I have copied them in among some of my own 



4^^ Burns' Ctarinda. 

most valued pieces, which I keep sacred for my 
own use. Do let me have a few now and then. 

Did you, Madam, know what I feel when you 
talk of your sorrows ! 

Good God ! that one who has so much worth 
in the sight of Heaven, and is so amiable to her 
fellow-creatures, should be so unhappy. I can't 
venture out for cold. My limb is vastly better ; 
but I have not any use of it without my crutches. 
Monday, for the first time, I dine at a neigh- 
bour's, next door. As soon as I can go so far, 
even in a coachy my first visit shall be to you. 
Write me when you leave town, and immediately 
when you return ; and I earnestly pray your 
stay may be short. You can't imagine how 
miserable you made me when you hinted to me 

not to write. Farewell. 

Sylvander. 

No. VII. 
To Clarinda. 

{After New Yearns Day, 1788.] 
You are right, my dear Clarinda : a friendly 
correspondence goes for nothing, except one 
write their undisguised sentiments. Yours 



Letters. 49 

please me for their intrinsic merit, as well as 
because they are yours, which, I assure you, is to 
me a high recommendation. Your religious sen- 
timents. Madam, I revere. If you have, on some 
suspicious evidence, from some lying oracle 
learned that I despise or ridicule so sacredly 
important a matter as real religion, you have, 
my Clarinda, much misconstrued your friend ; — 
" I am not mad, most noble Festus ! " Have 
you ever met a perfect character ? Do we not 
sometimes rather exchange faults than get rid 
of them? For instance, I am perhaps tired 
with and shocked at a life too much the prey 
of giddy inconsistencies and thoughtless follies ; 
by degrees I grow sober, prudent, and statedly 
pious — I say statedly, because the most un- 
affected devotion is not at all inconsistent with 
my first character — I join the world in congratu- 
lating myself on the happy change. But let me 
pry more narrowly into this affair. Have I, 
at bottom, anything of a secret pride in these 
endowments and emendations ? Have I nothing 
of a Presbyterian sourness, a hypocritical seve- 
rity, when I survey my less regular neighbours ? 
In a word, have I missed all those nameless and 
numberless modifications of indistinct selfishness 
D 



50 Burns' Clarinda. 

which are so near our own eyes, we can scarcely 
bring them within the sphere of our vision, and 
which the known spotless cambric of our char- 
acter hides from the ordinary observer. 

My definition of worth is short : truth and 
humanity respecting our fellow-creatures ; rever- 
ence and humility in the presence of that Being, 
my Creator and Preserver, and who, I have 
every reason to believe, will one day be my 
Judge. The first part of my definition is the 
creature of unbiassed instinct ; the last is the 
child of after reflection. Where I found these 
two essentials, I would gently note, and slightly 
mention, any attendant flaws — flaws, the marks, 
the consequences of human nature. 

I can easily enter into the sublime pleasures 
that your strong imagination and keen sensi- 
bility must derive from religion, particularly if a 
little in the shade of misfortune ; but I own I 
cannot, without a marked grudge, see Heaven 
totally engross so amiable, so charming a woman, 
as my friend Clarinda ; and should be very well 
pleased at a circumsta7ice that would put it in 
the power of somebody (happy somebody !) to 
divide her attention, with all the delicacy and 
tenderness of an earthly attachment. 



Letters. 5 1 

You will not easily persuade me that you 
have not a grammatical knowledge of the Eng- 
lish language. So far from being inaccurate, 
you are elegant beyond any woman of my 
acquaintance, except one, whom I wish you 
knew. 

Your last verses to me have so delighted me, 
that I have got an excellent old Scots air that 
suits the measure, and you shall see them in 
print in the "Scots Musical Museum," a work pub- 
lishing by a friend of mine in this town. I want 
four stanzas ; you gave me but three, and one 
of them alluded to an expression in my former 
letter ; so I have taken your two first verses, 
with a slight alteration in the second, and have 
added a third ; but you must help me to a fourth. 
Here they are : the latter half of the first stanza 
would have been worthy of Sappho ; I am in 
raptures with it. 

" Talk not of Love, it gives me pain, 
For Love has been my foe : 
He bound me with an iron chain, 
And sunk me deep in woe. 

" But Friendship's pure and lasting joys 
My heart was form'd to prove : 
There, welcome, win and wear the prize. 
But never talk of love." 



52 Burns Clarinda. 

Your friendship much can make me blest, 
O why that bliss destroy ? 
[only] 
Why urge the odious one request, 
[will] 
You know I must deny ? 

The alteration in the second stanza is no 
improvement, but there was a slight inaccuracy 
in your rhyme. The third I only offer to your 
choice, and have left two words for your deter- 
mination. The air is "The Banks of Spey," 
and is most beautiful. 

To-morrow evening I intend taking a chair, 
and paying a visit at Park Place to a much- 
valued old friend. If I could be sure of finding 
you at home (and I will send one of the chair- 
men to call), I would spend from five to six 
o'clock with you, as I go past. I cannot do 
more at this time, as I have something on my 
hand that hurries me much. I propose giving 
you the first call, my old friend the second, and 

Miss , as I return home. Do not break 

any engagement for me, as I will spend another 
evening with you at any rate before I leave 
town. 

Do not tell me that you are pleased when 
your friends inform you of your faults. I am 



Letters, 53 

ignorant what they are ; but I am sure they 
must be such evanescent trifles, compared with 
your personal and mental accomplishments, that 
I would despise the ungenerous narrow soul who 
would notice any shadow of imperfections you 
may seem to have any other way than in the 
most delicate agreeable raillery. Coarse minds 
are not aware how much they injure the keenly- 
feeling tie of bosom-friendship, when, in their 
foolish officiousness, they mention what nobody 
cares for recollecting. People of nice sensibility 
and generous minds have a certain intrinsic 
dignity, that fires at being trifled with, or 
lowered, or even too nearly approached. 

You need make no apology for long letters : 
I am even with you. Many happy new-years 
to you, charming Clarinda ! I can't dissemble, 
were it to shun perdition. He who sees you as 
I have done, and does not love you, deserves to 
be damned for his stupidity ! He who loves 
you, and would injure you, deserves to be doubly 
damned for his villany ! Adieu. 

Sylvander. 

P.S. — What would you think of this for a 
fourth stanza ? 



54 Burns' Clarinda. 

Your thought, if love must harbour there, 

Conceal it in that thought, 
Nor cause me from my bosom tear 

The very friend I sought. 



No. VIII. 

To Clarinda. 

Some days, some nights, nay, some hours ^ 
like the " ten righteous persons in Sodom," save 
the rest of the vapid, tiresome, miserable months 
and years of life. One of these hours my dear 
Clarinda blest me with yesternight. 

" One well-spent hour, 
In such a tender circumstance for friends. 
Is better than an age of common time !" — THOMSON. 

My favourite feature in Milton's Satan is his 
manly fortitude in supporting what cannot be 
remedied — in short, the wild broken fragments 
of a noble exalted mind in ruins. I meant no 
more by saying he was a favourite hero of 
mine. 

I mentioned to you my letter to Dr Moore, 
giving an account of my life : it is truth, every 
word of it, and will give you a just idea of the 



Letters. 5 5 

man whom you have honoured with your friend- 
ship. I am afraid you will hardly be able to 
make sense of so torn a piece. Your verses I 
shall muse on deliciously, as I gaze on your 
image in my mind's eye, in my heart's core : 
they will be in time enough for a week to come. 
I am truly happy your headache is better. Oh, 
how can pain or evil be so daringly unfeeling, 
cruelly savage as to wound so noble a mind, so 
lovely a form ! 

My little fellow is all my namesake. Write 
me soon. My every, strongest good wishes 
attend you, Clarinda ! 

Sylvander. 

I know not what I have written, I am pes- 
tered with people around me. 



No. IX. 
To Clarinda. 

Tuesday Night {^January 8 .?]. 
I AM delighted, charming Clarinda, with your 
honest enthusiasm for religion. Those of either 
sex, but particularly the female, who are luke- 



56 Burns' Clarinda. 

warm in that most important of all things, " O 
my soul, come not thou into their secrets ! " 
I feel myself deeply interested in your good 
opinion, and will lay before you the outlines of 
my belief He who is our Author and Pre- 
server, and will one day be our Judge, must be 
(not for His sake in the way of duty, but from 
the native impulse of our hearts) the object of 
our reverential awe and grateful adoration ; He 
is almighty and all-bounteous, we are weak and 
dependent ; hence prayer and every other sort 

of devotion. " He is not willing that any 

should perish, but that all should come to ever- 
lasting life ; " consequently it must be in every 
one's power to embrace His offer of " everlasting 
life " ; otherwise He could not, in justice, con- 
demn those who did not. A mind pervaded, 
actuated, and governed by purity, truth, and 
charity, though it does not merit heaven, yet is 
an absolutely necessary prerequisite, without 
which heaven can neither be obtained nor en- 
joyed ; and, by Divine promise, such a mind 
shall never fail of attaining " everlasting life " : 
hence the impure, the deceiving, and the un- 
charitable extrude themselves from eternal bliss, 
by their unfitness for enjoying it. The Supreme 



Letters. 57 

Being has put the immediate administration of 
all this, for wise and good ends known to Him- 
self, into the hands of Jesus Christ — a great 
personage, whose relation to Him we cannot 
comprehend, but whose relation to us is [that 
of] a guide and Saviour ; and who, except for 
our own obstinacy and misconduct, will bring us 
all through various ways, and by various means, 
to bliss at last. 

These are my tenets, my lovely friend ; and 
which, I think, cannot be well disputed. My 
creed is pretty nearly expressed in the last 
clause of Jamie Deans's grace, an honest weaver 
in Ayrshire : " Lord, grant that we may lead a 
gude life ! for a gude life makes a gude end ; at 
least it helps weel." 

I am flattered by the entertainment you tell 
me you have found in my packet. You see me 
as I have been, you know me as I am, and may 
guess at what I am likely to be. I too may 
say, " Talk not of love," &c., for indeed he has 
" plunged me deep in woe ! " Not that I ever 
saw a woman who pleased unexceptionably, as 
my Clarinda elegantly says, " in the companion, 
the friend, and the mistress." One indeed I 
could except — one^ before passion threw its mists 



58 Burns' Clarinda. 

over my discernment, I knew the first of women ! 
Her name is indelibly written in my heart's core 
— but I dare not look in on it — a degree of 
agony would be the consequence. Oh, thou 
perfidious, cruel, mischief-making demon, who 
presidest over that frantic passion — thou mayst, 
thou dost poison my peace, but thou shalt not 
taint my honour — I would not, for a single 
moment, give an asylum to the most distant 
imagination, that would shadow the faintest 
outline of a selfish gratification, at the expense 
of her whose happiness is twisted with the 

threads of my existence. May she be as 

happy as she deserves ! And if my tenderest, 
faithfulest friendship can add to her bliss, I shall 
at least have one solid mine of enjoyment in my 
bosom. DorCt guess at these ravings ! 

I watched at our front window to-day, but 
was disappointed.* It has been a day of disap- 
pointments. I am just risen from a two hours' 
bout after supper, with silly or sordid souls, who 
could relish nothing in common with me but the 

* Mrs M'Lehose had promised to pass through his 
Square about two in the afternoon, and give him a nod 
if he were at the window of his room and she could 
discover it. 



Letters. 59 

port. One 'Tis now "witching time of 

night " ; and whatever is out of joint in the fore- 
going scrawl, impute it to enchantments and 
spells ; for I can't look over it, but will seal 
it up directly, as I don't care for to-morrow's 
criticisms on it. 

You are by this time fast asleep, Clarinda ; 
may good angels attend and guard you as con- 
stantly as my good wishes do ! 

" Beauty, which, whether waking or asleep, 
Shot forth peculiar graces." 

John Milton, I wish thy soul better rest than 
I expect on my pillow to-night. Oh, for a little 
of the cart-horse part of human nature ! Good- 
night, my dearest Clarinda ! 

Sylvander. 



No. X. 

To Clarinda. 

Thursday Noon \^ January 10?]. 
I AM certain I saw you, Clarinda ; but you don't 
look to the proper story for a poet's lodging — 

" Where Speculation roosted near the sky." 

I could almost have thrown myself over for very 



6o Burns' Clarinda. 

vexation. Why didn't you look higher ? It has 
spoilt my peace for this day. To be so near my 
charming Clarinda ; to miss her look while it 
was searching for me ! I am sure the soul is 
capable of disease, for mine has convulsed itself 
into an inflammatory fever. I am sorry for your 
little boy: do let me know to-morrow how he is. 

You have converted me, Clarinda (I shall love 
that name while I live : there is heavenly music 
in it !). Booth and Amelia I know well. Your 
sentiments on that subject, as they are on every 
subject, are just and noble. " To be feelingly 
alive to kindness and to unkindness " is a 
charming female character. 

What I said in my last letter, the powers of 
fuddling sociality only know for me. By yours, 
I understand my good star has been partly in 
my horizon when I got wild in my reveries. 
Had that evil planet, which has almost all my 
life shed its baleful rays on my devoted head, 
been as usual in its zenith, I had certainly 
blabbed something that would have pointed out 
to you the dear object of my tenderest friend- 
ship, and, in spite of me, something more. Had 
that fatal information escaped me, and it was 
merely chance or kind stars that it did not. 



Letters. 6i 

I had been undone. You would never have 
written me, except, perhaps, once more. Oh, I 
could curse circumstances ! and the coarse tie 
of human laws which keeps fast what common 
sense would loose, and which bars that happi- 
ness itself cannot give — happiness which other- 
wise love and honour would warrant ! But hold 
— I shall make no more " hairbreadth 'scapes." 

My friendship, Clarinda, is a life-rent business. 
My likings are both strong and eternal. I told 
you I had but one male friend : I have but two 
female. I should have a third, but she is sur- 
rounded by the blandishments of flattery and 
courtship. Her I register in my heart's core by 
Peggy Chalmers : Miss Nimmo can tell you how 
divine she is. She is worthy of a place in the 
same bosom with my Clarinda. That is the 
highest compliment I can pay her. Farewell, 
Clarinda ! Remember 

Sylvander. 

No. XL 
To Clarinda. 

Saturday Morning. 
Your thoughts on religion, Clarinda, shall be 
welcome. You may perhaps distrust me when 



62 Burns' Clarinda, 

I say 'tis also my favourite topic ; but mine is 
the religion of the bosom. I hate the very idea 
of a controversial divinity ; as I firmly believe, 
that every honest, upright man, of whatever sect, 
will be accepted of the Deity. If your verses, as 
you seem to hint, contain censure, except you 
want an occasion to break with me, don't send 
them. I have a little infirmity in my disposi- 
tion, that where I fondly love, or highly esteem, 
I cannot bear reproach. 

" Reverence thyself" is a sacred maxim, and 
I wish to cherish it. I think I told you Lord 
Bolingbroke's saying to Swift — " Adieu, dear 
Swift, with all thy faults, I love thee entirely ; 
make an effort to love me with all mine." A 
glorious sentiment, and without which there can 
be no friendship. I do highly, very highly 
esteem you indeed, Clarinda — you merit it all. 
Perhaps, too, I scorn dissimulation. I could 
fondly love you ; judge, then, what a madden- 
ing sting your reproach would be. " Oh, I have 
sins to Heaven^ but none to you ! " With what 
pleasure would I meet you to-day, but I cannot 
walk to meet the Fly. I hope to be able to see 
you ow foot ^ about the middle of next week. 

I am interrupted — perhaps you are not sorry 



Letters, 63 

for it, you will tell me — but I won't anticipate 
blame. Oh Clarinda ! did you know how dear 
to me is your look of kindness, your smile of 
approbation, you would not, either in prose or 
verse, risk a censorious remark. 

" Curst be the verse, how well soe'er it flow, 
That tends to make one worthy man my foe ! " 

Sylvander. 



No. XII. 

To Clarinda. 

You talk of weeping, Clarinda : some in- 
voluntary drops wet your lines as I read them. 
Offend me, my dearest angel ! You cannot 
offend me — you never offended me. If you had 
ever given me the least shadow of offence, so 
pardon me, my God, as I forgive Clarinda. I 
have read yours again ; it has blotted my paper. 
Though I find your letter has agitated me into 
a violent headache, I shall take a chair and be 
with you about eight. A friend is to be with us 
at tea, on my account, which hinders me from 
coming sooner. Forgive, my dearest Clarinda, 
my unguarded expressions. For Heaven's sake. 



64 Burns' Clarinda. 

forgive me, or I shall never be able to bear my 
own mind. 

Your unhappy 

Sylvander. 



No. XIII. 
To Clarinda. 

Monday Even^ 1 1 d clock. 
Why have I not heard from you, Clarinda? 
To-day I expected it ; and before supper, when 
a letter to me was announced, my heart danced 
with rapture : but behold, it was some fool, who 
had taken it into his head to turn poet, and 
made me an offering of the first-fruits of his 
nonsense. " It is not poetry, but prose run 
mad." Did I ever repeat to you an epigram I 
made on a Mr Elphinstone, who has given a 
translation of Martial, a famous Latin poet ? 
The poetry of Elphinstone can only equal his 
prose notes. I was sitting in a merchant's shop 
of my acquaintance, waiting somebody ; he put 
Elphinstone into my hand, and asked my 
opinion of it ; I begged leave to write it on a 
blank leaf which I did — 



Letters^ 65 

TO MR ELPHINSTONE, ETC. 

Oh thou, whom Poesy abhors ! 
Whom Prose has turned out of doors ! 
Heard'st thou yon groan ? — proceed no further ! 
'Twas laurelled Martial calling murther ! 

I am determined to see you, if at all possible, 
on Saturday evening. Next week I must sing — 

The night is my departing night, 
The morn's the day I maun awa' ; 

There's neither friend nor foe o' mine 
But wishes that I were awa' ! 

What I hae done for lack o' wit, 

I never, never can reca' ; 
I hope ye're a' my friends as yet — 

Gude night, and joy be wi' you a' ! 

If I could see you sooner, I would be so much 
the happier ; but I would not purchase the 
dearest gratification on earth, if it must be at 
your expense in worldly censure, far less inward 
peace. 

I shall certainly be ashamed of thus scrawling 
whole sheets of incoherence. The only unity (a 
sad word with poets and critics !) in my ideas is 
Clarin DA. There my heart " reigns and revels ! " 

" What art thou, Love ? whence are those charms. 
That thus thou bear'st an universal rule ? 
For thee the soldier quits his arms, 
The king turns slave, the wise man fool. 
E 



66 Burns' Clarinda. 

In vain we chase thee from the field, 
And with cool thoughts resist thy yoke : 

Next tide of blood, alas, we yield, 
And all those high resolves are broke ! " 

I like to have quotations for every occasion. 
They give one's ideas so pat, and save one the 
trouble of finding expression adequate to one's 
feelings. I think it is one of the greatest plea- 
sures attending a poetic genius, that we can give 
our woes, cares, joys, loves, &c., an embodied 
form in verse, which to me is ever immediate 
ease. Goldsmith says finely of his Muse — 

" Thou source of all my bliss and all my woe. 
Thou found'st me poor at first, and keep'st me so." 

My limb has been so well to-day, that I have 

gone up and down stairs often without my staff 

To-morrow I hope to walk once again on my 

own legs to dinner. It is only next street. 

Adieu ! c" 

Sylvander. 

No. XIV. 
To Clarinda. 

Tuesday Evening \_ January 1 5 ?]. 
That you have faults, my Clarinda, I never 
doubted ; but I knew not where they existed, 



Letters. 6y 

and Saturday night made me more in the dark 
than ever. Oh Clarinda ! why will you wound 
my soul by hinting that last night must have 
lessened my opinion of you ? True, I was 
" behind the scenes " with you ; but what did 
I see? A bosom glowing with honour and 
benevolence; a mind ennobled by genius, in- 
formed and refined by education and reflection, 
and exalted by native religion, genuine as in 
the climes of heaven ; a heart formed for all the 
glorious meltings of friendship, love, and pity. 
These I saw : I saw the noblest immortal soul 
creation ever showed me. 

I looked long, my dear Clarinda, for your 
letter ; and am vexed that you are complaining. 
I have not caught you so far wrong as in your 
idea, that the commerce you have with one 
friend hurts you if you cannot tell every tittle 
of it to another. Why have so injurious a sus- 
picion of a good God, Clarinda, as to think 
that Friendship and Love, on the sacred in- 
violate principles of Truth, Honour, and Reli- 
gion, can be anything else than an object of 
His divine approbation ? 

I have mentioned in some of my former 
scrawls, Saturday evening next. Do allow me 



68 Burns' Clarinda. 

to wait on you that evening. Oh, my angel ! 

how soon must we part! and when can we' 

meet again ! I look forward on the horrid 

interval with tearful eyes. What have I lost 

by not knowing you sooner? I fear, I fear 

my acquaintance with you is too short, to make 

that lasting impression on your heart I could 

wish. 

Sylvander. 

No. XV. 
To Clarinda. 

Sunday Night \Ja7tuary 20 .?]. 
The impertinence of fools has joined with 
a return of an old indisposition to make me 
good for nothing to-day. The paper has lain 
before me all this evening to write to my dear 
Clarinda ; but 

" Fools rush'd on fools, as waves succeed to waves." 

I cursed them in my soul : they sacrilegiously 
disturb my meditations on her who holds my 
heart. What a creature is man ! A little alarm 
last night and to-day that I am mortal, has 
made such a revolution in my spirits ! there 



Letters. 69 

is no philosophy, no divinity, comes half so 
home to the mind. I have no idea of the 
courage that braves Heaven. 'Tis the wild 
ravings of an imaginary hero in Bedlam. I 
can no more, Clarinda ; I can scarce hold up 
my head ; but I am happy you don't know it, 
you would be so uneasy. 

Sylvander. 

Monday Morning. 
I am, my lovely friend, much better this 
morning, on the whole ; but I have a horrid 
languor on my spirits — 

" Sick of the world and all its joy, 
My soul in pining sadness mourns : 
Dark scenes of woe my mind employ, 
The past and present in their turns." 

Have you ever met with a saying of the great 
and likewise good Mr Locke, author of the 
famous " Essay on the Human Understand- 
ing " ? He wrote a letter to a friend, directing 
it " Not to be delivered till after my decease." 
It ended thus : — " I know you loved me when 
living, and will preserve my memory now I am 
dead. All the use to be made of it is — that 
this life affords no solid satisfaction, but in 



yo Burns' Clarinda. 

the consciousness of having done well, and the 
hopes of another life. Adieu ! I leave my best 
wishes with you. — J. LoCKE." 

Clarinda, may I reckon on your friendship for 
life ? I think I may. Thou Almighty Pre- 
server of men ! Thy friendship, which hitherto 
I have too much neglected, to secure it shall all 
the future days and nights of my life be my 
steady care ! The idea of my Clarinda fol- 
lows : — 

" Hide it, my heart, within that close disguise. 
Where, mix'd with God's, her loved idea lies." 

But I fear inconstancy, the consequent imper- 
fection of human weakness. Shall I meet with 
a friendship that defies years of absence, and 
the chances and changes of fortune? Perhaps 
" such things are." One honest man I have 
great hopes from, that way ; but who, except 
a romance writer, would think on a love that 
could promise for life, in spite of distance, 
absence, chance, and change ; and that, too, 
with slender hopes of fruition ? For my own 
part, I can say to myself in both requisitions, 
" Thou art the man " ; I dare in cool resolve, I 
dare declare myself that friend and that lover. 
If womankind is capable of such things, Clar- 



Letters. 7^ 

inda is. I trust that she is ; and feel I shall 
be miserable if she is not. There is not one 
virtue which gives worth, or one sentiment 
which does honour to the sex, that she does 
not possess superior to any woman I ever saw : 
her exalted mind, aided a little perhaps by her 
situation, is, I think, capable of that nobly- 
romantic love-enthusiasm. 

May I see you on Wednesday evening, my 
dear angel ? The next Wednesday again will, 
I conjecture, be a hated day to us both. I 
tremble for censorious remarks for your sake ; 
but in extraordinary cases, may not usual and 
useful precautions be a little dispensed with? 
Three evenings, three swift-winged evenings, 
with pinions of down, are all the past — I dare 
not calculate the future. I shall call at Miss 
Nimmo's to-morrow evening; 'twill be a fare- 
well call. 

I have written out my last sheet of paper, so 
I am reduced to my last half-sheet. What a 
strange, mysterious faculty is that thing called 
imagination ! We have no ideas almost at all 
of another world ; but I have often amused 
myself with visionary schemes of what happi- 
ness might be enjoyed by small alterations — 



72 Burns' Clarinda. 

alterations that we can fully enter to \sic\ in this 
present state of existence. For instance, sup- 
pose you and I just as we are at present, the 
same reasoning powers, sentiments, and even 
desires ; the same fond curiosity for knowledge 
and remarking observation in our minds — and 
imagine our bodies free from pain, and the 
necessary supplies for the wants ' of nature at 
all times and easily within our reach; imagine 
further that we were set free from the laws of 
gravitation which bind us to this globe, and 
could at pleasure fly, without inconvenience, 
through all the yet unconjectured bounds of 
creation — what a life of bliss should we lead 
in our mutual pursuit of virtue and knowledge, 
and our mutual enjoyment of friendship and 
love ! 

I see you laughing at my fairy fancies, and 
calling me a voluptuous Mahometan ; but I am 
certain I should be a happy creature, beyond 
anything we call bliss here below ; nay, it would 
be a paradise congenial to you too. Don't you 
see us hand in hand, or rather my arm about 
your lovely waist, making our remarks on Sirius, 
the nearest of the fixed stars ; or surveying a 
comet flaming innoxious by us, as we just now 



Letters. 73 

would mark the passing pomp of a travelling 
monarch ; or in a shady bower of Mercury or 
Venus, dedicating the hour to love and mutual 
converse, relying honour, and revelling endear- 
ment — while the most exalted strains of poesy 
and harmony would be the ready, spontaneous 
language of our souls ? Devotion is the favour- 
ite employment of your heart, so is it of mine ; 
what incentives then to, and powers for rever- 
ence, gratitude, faith, and hope, in all the 
fervours of adoration and praise to that Being 
whose unsearchable wisdom, power, and good- 
ness, so pervaded, so inspired every sense and 
feeling! By this time, I daresay, you will be 
blessing the neglect of the maid that leaves me 

destitute of paper. 

Sylvander. 

No. XVI. 
To Clarinda. 

Thursday Morning [January 24?]. 
" Unlavish Wisdom never works in vain." 
I HAVE been tasking my reason, Clarinda, why 
a woman, who, for native genius, poignant wit, 
strength of mind, generous sincerity of soul, and 



74 Burns' Clarinda. 

the sweetest female tenderness, is without a peer, 
and whose personal charms have few, very, very 
few parallels among her sex ; why, or how she 
should fall to the blessed lot of a poor hairum- 
scairum poet whom Fortune had kept for her 
particular use, to wreak her temper on whenever 
she was in ill-humour. One time I conjectured 
that as Fortune is the most capricious jade ever 
known, she may have taken, not a fit of remorse, 
but a paroxysm of whim, to raise the poor devil 
out of the mire, where he had so often and so 
conveniently served her as a stepping-stone, and 
given him the most glorious boon she ever had 
in her gift, merely for the maggot's sake, to see 
how his fool head and his fool heart will bear 
it. At other times I was vain enough to think 
that Nature, who has a great deal to say with 
Fortune, had given the coquettish goddess some 
such hint as, " Here is a paragon of female ex- 
cellence, whose equal, in all my former com- 
positions, I never was lucky enough to hit on, 
and despair of ever doing so again ; you have 
cast her rather in the shades of life ; there is a 
certain poet of my making ; among your frolics 
it would not be amiss to attach him to this 
masterpiece of my hand, to give her that 



Letters. 75 

immortality among mankind, which no woman 
of any age ever more deserved, and which few 
rhymesters of this age are better able to confer." 

Evenmg, 9 o'clock. 
I am here, absolutely so unfit to finish my 
letter — pretty hearty after a bowl, which has 
been constantly plied since dinner till this 
moment. I have been with Mr Schetki, the 
musician, and he has set the song finety. I 
have no distinct ideas of anything, but that I 
have drunk your health twice to-night, and that 
you are all my soul holds dear in this world. 

Sylvander. 



No. XVII. 
To Clarinda. 

Friday {February i ?]. 
Clarinda, my life, you have wounded my soul. 
Can I think of your being unhappy, even though 
it be not described in your pathetic elegance of 
language, without being miserable ? Clarinda, 
can I bear to be told from you that " you will 
not see me to-morrow night — that you wish the 



y6 Burns' Clarinda. 

hour of parting were come"? Do not let us 
impose on ourselves by sounds. . . . Why, my 
love, talk to me in such strong terms ; every 
word of which cuts me to the very soul ? You 
know, a hint, the slightest signification of your 
wish, is to me a sacred command. 

Be reconciled, my angel, to your God, your- 
self, and me ; and I pledge you Sylvander's 
honour — an oath I daresay you will trust with- 
out reserve — that you shall never more have 
reason to complain of his conduct. Now, my 
love, do not wound our next meeting with any 
averted looks. ... I have marked the line of 
conduct — a line, I know, exactly to your taste — 
and which I will inviolably keep ; but do not 
you show the least inclination to make boun- 
daries. Seeming distrust, where you know you 
may confide, is a cruel sin against sensibility. 

" Delicacy, you know, it was which won me to 
you at once : take care that you do not loosen 
the dearest, most sacred tie that unites us." 
Clarinda, I would not have stung your soul — I 
would not have bruised j/^?^r spirit, as that harsh, 
crucifying "Take care," did mine; no, not to 
have gained heaven ! Let me again appeal to 
your dear self, if Sylvander, even when he 



Letters. yy 

seemingly half transgressed the laws of decorum, 
if he did not show more chastised, trembling, 
faltering delicacy, than the many of the world 
do in keeping these laws. 

Love and Sensibility, ye have conspired 
against my peace ! I love to madness, and I 
feel to torture ! Clarinda, how can I forgive 
myself that I have ever touched a single chord 
in your bosom with pain ! Would I do it 
willingly ? Would any consideration, any grati- 
fication make me do so ? Oh, did you love like 
me, you would not, you could not, deny or put 
off a meeting with the man who adores you ; 
who would die a thousand deaths before he 
would injure you ; and who must soon bid you 
a long farewell ! 

1 had proposed bringing my bosom friend, 
Mr Ainslie, to-morrow evening, at his strong 
request, to see you ; as he has only time to stay 
with us about ten minutes, for an engagement. 
But I shall hear from you ; this afternoon, for 
mercy's sake ! — for, till I hear from you, I am 
wretched. Oh, Clarinda, the tie that binds me 
to thee is intwisted, incorporated with my 
dearest threads of life ! 

Sylvander. 



yS Bunis^ Clarmda. 

No. XVIII. 
To Clarinda. 

I WAS on my way, my love, to meet you (I 
never do things by halves) when I got your 
card. Mr Ainslie goes out of town to-morrow 
morning to see a brother of his, who is newly 
arrived from France. I am determined that he 
and I shall call on you together. So look you, 
lest I should never see to-morrow, we will call 
on you to-night. Mary *' and you may put off 
tea till about seven, at which time, in the 
Galloway phrase, " an the beast be to the fore, 
and the branks bide hale," expect the humblest 
of your humble servants, and his dearest friend. 
We only propose staying half an hour — "for 
ought we ken." I could suffer the lash of misery 
eleven months in the year, were the twelfth to 
be composed of hours like yesternight. You 
are the soul of my enjoyment — all else is of the 
stuff of stocks and stones. 

Sylvander. 

* One of Mrs M'Lehose's friends. 



Letters. 79 

No. XIX. 

To Clarinda. 

Sunday Noon. 
I HAVE almost given up the Excise idea. I 
have been just now to wait on a great person, 

Miss 's friend . Why will great people 

not only deafen us with the din of their equipage, 
and dazzle us with their fastidious pomp, but 
they must also be so very dictatorily wise ? I 
have been questioned like a child about my 
matters, and blamed and schooled for my in- 
scription on the Stirling window. Come, 
Clarinda ! — " Come, curse me Jacob ; come, 
defy me Israel ! " 

Sunday Night. 

I have been with Miss Nimmo. She is indeed 
" a good soul," as my Clarinda finely says. She 
has reconciled me, in a good measure, to the 
world with her friendly prattle. 

Schetki has sent me the song, set to a fine 
air of his composing. I have called the song 
" Clarinda " : I have carried it about in my 
pocket, and hummed it over all day. 



8o Burns' Clarinda. 

Monday Morning. 
If my prayers have any weight in heaven, this 
morning looks in on you and finds you in the 
arms of peace, except where it is charmingly 
interrupted by the ardours of devotion. I find 
so much serenity of mind, so much positive 
pleasure, so much fearless daring toward the 
world, when I warm in devotion, or feel the 
glorious sensation — a consciousness of Almighty 
friendship — that I am sure I shall soon be an 
honest enthusiast. 

" How are Thy servants blest, O Lord ! 
How sure is their defence ! 
Eternal wisdom is their guide, 
Their help Omnipotence ! " 

I am, my dear Madam, yours, 

Sylvander. 

No. XX. 

To Clarinda. 

Suitday Morning. 
I HAVE just been before the throne of my 
God, Clarinda; according to my association of 
ideas, my sentiments of love and friendship, I 



Letters. 8 1 

next devote myself to you. Yesternight I was 
happy — happiness that the world cannot give. 
I kindle at the recollection ; but it is a flame 
where innocence looks smiling on, and honour 
stands by, a sacred guard. Your heart, your 
fondest wishes, your dearest thoughts, these are 
yours to bestow : your person is unapproachable 
by the laws of your country ; and he loves not 
as I do who would make you miserable. 

You are an angel, Clarinda : you are surely 
no mortal that " the earth owns." To kiss your 
hand, to live on your smile, is to me far more 
exquisite bliss than the dearest favours that the 
fairest of the sex, yourself excepted, can bestow. 



Stmday Evening. 
You are the constant companion of my 
thoughts. How wretched is the condition of 
one who is haunted with conscious guilt, and 
trembling under the idea of dreaded vengeance ! 
and what a placid calm, what a charming secret 
enjoyment it gives, to bosom the kind feelings 
of friendship and the formal throes of love ! 
Out upon the tempest of anger, the acrimonious 
gall of fretful impatience, the sullen frost of 
F 



82 Burns' Clarinda. 

louring resentment, or the corroding poison of 
withered envy ! They eat up the immortal part 
of man. If they spent their fury only on the 
unfortunate objects of them, it would be some- 
thing in their favour ; but these miserable 
passions, like traitor Iscariot, betray their lord 
and master. 

The Almighty Author of peace, and goodness, 
and love ! do Thou give me the social heart 
that kindly tastes of every man's cup ! Is it a 
draught of joy ? — warm and open my heart to 
share it with cordial, unenvying rejoicing. Is it 
the bitter potion of sorrow? — melt my heart 
with sincerely sympathetic woe. Above all, do 
Thou give me the manly mind that resolutely 
exemplifies, in life and manners, those senti- 
ments which I would wish to be thought to 
possess. The friend of my soul ; there, may I 
never deviate from the firmest fidelity and most 
active kindness ! Clarinda, the dear object of 
my fondest love ; there, may the most sacred 
inviolate honour, the most faithful kindling 
constancy, ever watch and animate my every 
thought and imagination ! 

Did you ever meet with the following lines 
spoken of religion — your darling topic ? — 



Letters, 83 

" ^Tis this, my friend, that streaks our morning bright ; 
^Tis this that gilds the horrors of our night ; 
When wealth forsakes us, and when friends are few, 
When friends are faithless, or when foes pursue ; 
'Tis this that wards the blow, or stills the smart, 
Disarms affliction, or repels its dart ; 
Within the breast bids purest rapture rise, 
Bids smiling Conscience spread her cloudless skies." 

I met with these verses very early in life, and 
was so delighted with them, that I have them by 
me, copied at school. 

Good night and sound rest, my dearest 
Clarinda ! 

Sylvander. 



No. XXI. 

To Clarinda. 

Thursday Night. 
I CANNOT be easy, my Clarinda, while any 
sentiment respecting me in your bosom gives 
me pain. If there is no man on earth to whom 
your heart and affections are justly due, it may 
savour of imprudence, but never of criminality, 
to bestow that heart and those affections where 
you please. The God of love meant and made 
those delicious attachments to be bestowed on 



84 Burns* Clarinda, 

somebody ; and even all the imprudence lies 
in bestowing them on an unworthy object. If 
this reasoning is conclusive, as it certainly is, 
I must be allowed to " talk of love." 

It is, perhaps, rather wrong to speak highly 
to a friend of his letter : it is apt to lay one 
under a little restraint in their future letters, 
and restraint is the death of a friendly epistle ; 
but there is one passage in your last charming 
letter, Thomson or Shenstone never exceeded it, 
nor often came up to it. I shall certainly steal 
it, and set it in some future poetic production, 
and get immortal fame by it. 'Tis when you 
bid the scenes of nature remind me of Clarinda. 
Can I- forget you, Clarinda ? I would detest 
myself as a tasteless, unfeeling, insipid, infamous 
blockhead. I have loved women of ordinary 
merit, whom I could have loved for ever. You 
are the first, the only unexceptionable individual 
of the beauteous sex that I ever met with ; and 
never woman more entirely possessed my soul. 
I know myself, and how far I can depend on 
passion's swell. It has been my peculiar study. 

I thank you for going to Miers. Urge him, 
for necessity calls, to have it done by the middle 
of next week : Wednesday the latest day. I 



Letters. 85 

want it for a breast-pin, to wear next my heart. 
I propose to keep sacred set times, to wander 
in the woods and wilds for meditation on you. 
Then, and only then, your lovely image shall be 
produced to the day, with a reverence akin to 
devotion. 



To-morrow night shall not be the last. 
Good night ! I am perfectly stupid, as I 
supped late yesternight. 

Sylvander. 



No. XXII. 

To Clarinda. 

Saturday Morning. 
There is no time, my Clarinda, when the 
conscious thrilling chords of love and friendship 
give such delight, as in the pensive hours of 
what our favourite Thomson calls " philosophic 
melancholy." The sportive insects, who bask in 
the sunshine of prosperity, or the worms, that 
luxuriant crawl amid their ample wealth of 
earth ; they need no Clarinda — they would 
despise Sylvander, if they dared. The family of 



86 Burns^ Clarinda. 

Misfortune, a numerous group of brothers and 
sisters ! they need a resting-place to their souls. 
Unnoticed, often condemned by the world — in 
some degree, perhaps, condemned by themselves 
— they feel the full enjoyment of ardent love, 
delicate, tender endearments, mutual esteem, 
and mutual reliance. 

In this light I have often admired religion. 
In proportion as we are wrung with grief, or 
distracted with anxiety, the ideas of a com- 
passionate Deity, an Almighty Protector, are 
doubly dear. 

" 'Tis this, my friend, that streaks our morning bright ; 
'Tis this that gilds the horrors of our night." 

I have been this morning taking a peep 
through, as Young finely says, "the dark 
postern of time long elapsed " ; and you will 
easily guess 'twas a rueful prospect. What a 
tissue of thoughtlessness, weakness, and folly ! 
My life reminded me of a ruined temple : what 
strength, what proportion in some parts ! — what 
unsightly gaps, what prostrate ruins in others ! 
I kneeled down before the Father of Mercies, 
and said, " Father, I have sinned against 
Heaven, and in Thy sight, and am no more 



Letters. 87 

worthy to be called Thy son ! " I rose, eased 
and strengthened. I despise the superstition of 
a fanatic, but I love the religion of a man. 
" The future," said I to myself, " is still before 
me : there let me 

' On reason build resolve — 
That column of true majesty in man ! ' 

I have difficulties many to encounter," said I ; 
" but they are not absolutely insuperable : and 
where is firmness of mind shown, but in exer- 
tion ? Mere declamation is bombast rant. 
Besides, wherever I am, or in whatever situation 
I may be — 

' Tis nought to me, 

Since God is ever present, ever felt, 

In the void waste as in the city full ; 

And where He vital breathes, there must be joy.' " 

Saturday Nighty Half after Ten. 
What luxury of bliss I v/as enjoying at this 
time yesternight ! My ever dearest Clarinda, 
you have stolen away my soul : but you have 
refined, you have exalted it ; you have given it 
a stronger sense of virtue, and a stronger relish 
for piety. Clarinda, first of your sex ! if ever I 
am the veriest wretch on earth to forget you — 



88 Btcnis' Clarinda. 

if ever your lovely image is effaced from my 
soul — 

" May I be lost, no eye to weep my end, 
And find no earth that's base enough to bury me ! " 

What trifling silliness is the childish fondness 
of the every-day children of the world ! 'Tis 
the unmeaning toying of the younglings of the 
fields and forests ; but, where sentiment and 
fancy unite their sweets, where taste and deli- 
cacy refine, where wit adds the flavour, and 
good sense gives strength and spirit to all, what 
a delicious draught is the hour of tender 
endearment ! 

No. XXIII. 
To Clarinda. 

. . . I AM a discontented ghost, a perturbed 
spirit. Clarinda, if you ever forget Sylvander, 
may you be happy, but he will be miserable. 

Oh, what a fool I am in love ! what an 
extravagant prodigal of affection ! Why are 
your sex called the tender sex, when I never 
have met with one who can repay me in 
passion ? They are either not so rich in love 
as I am, or they are niggards where I am lavish. 



Letters. 89 

Thou, whose I am, and whose are all my 
ways ! Thou see'st me here, the hapless wreck 
of tides and tempests in my own bosom : do 
Thou direct to Thyself that ardent love, for 
which I have so often sought a return in vain 
from my fellow-creatures ! If Thy goodness 
has yet such a gift in store for me as an equal 
return of affection from her who, Thou knowest, 
is dearer to me than life, do Thou bless and 
hallow our band of love and friendship ; watch 
over us, in all our outgoings and incomings for 
good ; and may the tie that unites our hearts be 
strong and indissoluble as the thread of man's 
immortal life ! 

1 am just going to take your blackbird, the 
sweetest, I am sure, that ever sung, and prune 
its wings a little. 

Sylvander. 



No. XXIV. 
To Clarinda. 

Tuesday Morning. 
I CANNOT go out to-day, my dearest love, 
without sending you half a line by way of a sin- 



90 Burns^ Clarinda. 

offering ; but, believe me, 'twas the sin of ignor- 
ance. Could you think that I intended to hurt 
you by anything I said yesternight? Nature 
has been too kind to you for your happiness, 
your delicacy, your sensibility. Oh why should 
such glorious qualifications be the fruitful source 
of woe ! You have " murdered sleep " to me last 
night. I went to bed impressed with an idea 
that you were unhappy ; and every start I 
closed my eyes, busy Fancy painted you in such 
scenes of romantic misery, that I would almost 
be persuaded you are not well this morning. 

" If I unwitting have offended, 
Impute it not." 

" But while we live 
But one short hour, perhaps, between us two 
Let there be peace." 

If Mary has not gone by the time this reaches 
you, give her my best compliments. She is a 
charming girl, and highly worthy of the noblest 
love. 

I send you a poem to read till I call on you 
this night, which will be about nine. I wish 
I could procure some potent spell, some fairy 
charm, that would protect from injury, or restore 
to rest, that bosom chord, " trembling alive all 



Letters. 91 

o'er," on which hangs your peace of mind. I 
thought, vainly I fear thought, that the devotion 
of love — love strong as even you can feel, love 
guarded, invulnerably guarded, by all the purity 
of virtue, and all the pride of honour — I thought 
such a love might make you happy. Shall I be 
mistaken? I can no more, for hurry. 



No. XXV. 
To Clarinda. 

Friday Morniiig, 7 o'clock. 
Your fears for Mary are truly laughable. I 
suppose, my love, you and I showed her a 
scene which, perhaps, made her wish that she 
had a swain, and one who could love like me ; 
and 'tis a thousand pities that so good a heart 
as hers should want an aim, an object. I am 
miserably stupid this morning. Yesterday I 
dined with a baronet, and sat pretty late over 
the bottle. And " who hath woe — who hath 
sorrow ? they that tarry long at the wine ; they 
that go to seek mixed wine." Forgive me, 
likewise, a quotation from my favourite author. 



92 Burns' Ctarinda. 

Solomon's knowledge of the world is very great. 
He may be looked on as the Spectator or 
Adventurer of his day : and it is, indeed, sur- 
prising what a sameness has ever been in human 
nature. The broken, but strongly characterising 
hints, that the royal author gives us of the 
manners of the court of Jerusalem and country 
of Israel are, in their great outlines, the same 
pictures that London and England, Versailles 
and France, exhibit some three thousand years 
later. The loves in the " Song of Songs " are 
all in the spirit of Lady M. W. Montagu, or 
Madame Ninon de I'Enclos ; though, for my 
part, I dislike both the ancient and modern 
voluptuaries ; and will dare to affirm, that such 
an attachment as mine to Clarinda, and such 
evenings as she and I have spent, are what 
these greatly respectable and deeply experienced 
judges of life and love never dreamed of. 

I shall be with you this evening between 
eight and nine, and shall keep as sober hours 
as you could wish. 

I am ever, my dear Madam, yours, 

SYLVANDER. 



Letters. 93 

No. XXVI. 

To Clarinda. 

My ever dearest Clarinda, 

I make a numerous dinner-party wait me 
while I read yours and write this. Do not 
require that I should cease to love you, to adore 
you in my soul ; 'tis to me impossible : your 
peace and happiness are to me dearer than my 
soul. Name the terms on which you wish to 
see me, to correspond with me, and you have 
them. I must love, pine, mourn, and adore in 
secret : this you must not deny me. You will 
ever be to me 

" Dear as the light that visits those sad eyes, 
Dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart." 

I have not patience to read the Puritanic scrawl. 
Damned sophistry 1 Ye heavens. Thou God of 
nature. Thou Redeemer of mankind ! ye look 
down with approving eyes on a passion inspired 
by the purest flame, and guarded by truth, 
delicacy, and honour ; but the half-inch soul of 
an unfeeling, cold-blooded, pitiful Presbyterian 
bigot cannot forgive anything above his dungeon- 
bosom and foggy head. 



94 Burns' Clarinda, 

Farewell ! I'll be with you to-morrow even- 
ing ; and be at rest in your mind. I will be 
yours in the way you think most to your happi- 
ness. I dare not proceed. I love, and will love 
you ; and will, with joyous confidence, approach 
the throne of the Almighty Judge of men with 
your dear idea ; and will despise the scum of 
sentiment and the mist of sophistry. 

Sylvander. 



No. XXVII. 
To Clarinda. 

Wednesday^ Midnight. 

Madam, 

After a wretched day, I am preparing for 
a sleepless night. I am going to address myself 
to the Almighty Witness of my actions — some 
time, perhaps very soon, my Almighty Judge. 
I am not going to be the advocate of Passion : 
be Thou my inspirer and testimony, O God, as 
I plead the cause of truth ! 

I have read over your friend's haughty, dicta- 
torial letter : you are only answerable to your 
God in such a matter. Who gave any fellow- 



Letters, 95 

creature of yours (a fellow-creature incapable of 
being your judge, because not your peer) a right 
to catechise, scold, undervalue, abuse, and insult, 
wantonly and inhumanly to insult, you thus ? I 
don't wish, not even wish, to deceive you. Madam. 
The Searcher of hearts is my witness how dear 
you are to me ; but though it were possible you 
could be still dearer to me, I would not even 
kiss your hand at the expense of your conscience. 
Away with declamation ! let us appeal to the 
bar of common sense. It is not mouthing 
everything sacred ; it is not vague ranting asser- 
tions ; it is not assuming, haughtily and insult- 
ingly assuming, the dictatorial language of a 
Roman pontiff, that must dissolve a union like 
ours. Tell me. Madam, are you under the least 
shadow of an obligation to bestow your love, 
tenderness, caresses, affections, heart and soul, 
on Mr M'Lehose — the man who has repeatedly, 
habitually, and barbarously broken through 
every tie of duty, nature, or gratitude to you? 
The laws of your country, indeed, for the most 
useful reasons of policy and sound government, 
have made your person inviolate ; but are your 
heart and affections bound to one who gives not 
the least return of either to you ? You cannot 



96 Btcrns^ Clarinda. 

do it ; it is not in the nature of things that you 
are bound to do it ; the common feelings of 
humanity forbid it. Have you, then, a heart 
and affections which are no man's right ? You 
have. It would be highly, ridiculously absurd 
to suppose the contrary. Tell me, then, in the 
name of common sense, can it be wrong, is such 
a supposition compatible with the plainest ideas 
of right and wrong, that it is improper to bestow 
the heart and these affections on another — while 
that bestowing is not in the smallest degree 
hurtful to your duty to God, to your children, to 
yourself, or to society at large ? 

This is the great test ; the consequences : let 
us see them. In a widowed, forlorn, lonely 
situation, with a bosom glowing with love and 
tenderness, yet so delicately situated that you 
cannot indulge these nobler feelings except you 
meet with a man who has a soul capable . . . 



No. XXVIII. 
To Clarinda. 

" I AM distressed for thee, my brother Jona- 
than." I have suffered, Clarinda, from your 



Letters. 97 

letter. My soul was in arms at the sad perusal. 
I dreaded that I had acted wrong. If I have 
wronged you, God forgive me. But, Clarinda, 
be comforted. Let us raise the tone of our 
feelings a little higher and bolder. A fellow- 
creature who leaves us — who spurns us without 
just cause, though once our bosom friend — up 
with a little honest pride : let him go ! How 
shall I comfort you, who am the cause of the 
injury? Can I wish that I had never seen you 
— that we had never met? No, I never will. 
But, have I thrown you friendless ? — there is 
almost distraction in the thought. Father of 
Mercies ! against Thee often have I sinned : 
through Thy grace I will endeavour to do so no 
more. She who. Thou knowest, is dearer to me 
than myself — pour Thou the balm of peace into 
her past wounds, and hedge her about with 
Thy peculiar care, all her future days and 
nights. Strengthen her tender, noble mind 
firmly to suffer and magnanimously to bear. 
Make me worthy of that friendship, that love 
she honours me with. May my attachment to 
her be pure as devotion, and lasting as immortal 
life ! O Almighty Goodness, hear me ! Be to 
her at all times, particularly in the hour of 
G 



g^ Burns* Clarinda. 

distress or trial, a friend and comforter, a guide 
and guard. 

" How are Thy servants blest, O Lord, 
How sure is their defence ! 
Eternal wisdom is their guide, 
Their help Omnipotence." 

Forgive me, Clarinda, the injury I have done 
you. To-night I shall be with you, as indeed I 
shall be ill at ease till I see you. 

Sylvander. 



No. XXIX. 
To Clarinda. 

Two d clock. 
I JUST now received your first letter of yester- 
day, by the careless negligence of the penny- 
post. Clarinda, matters are grown very serious 
with us ; then seriously hear me, and hear me, 
Heaven — I met you, my dear . . . , by far the 
first of womankind, at least to me ; I esteemed, 
I loved you at first sight ; the longer I am 
acquainted with you, the more innate amiable- 
ness and worth I discover in you. You have 
suffered a loss, I confess, for my sake : but if the 
firmest, steadiest, warmest friendship — if every 



Letters. 99 

endeavour to be worthy of your friendship — if a 
love, strong as the ties of nature, and holy as 
the duties of religion — if all these can make 
anything like a compensation for the evil I have 
occasioned you, if they be worth your acceptance, 
or can in the least add to your enjoyments — so 
help Sylvander, ye Powers above, in his hour of 
need, as he freely gives these all to Clarinda ! 

I esteem you, I love you as a friend : I admire 
you, I love you as a woman beyond any one in 
all the circle of creation ; I know I shall continue 
to esteem you, to love you, to pray for you — nay, 
to pray for myself for your sake. 

Expect me at eight — and believe me to be 
ever, my dearest Madam, 

Yours most entirely, 

Sylvander. 



No. XXX. 

To Clarinda. 

When matters, my love, are desperate, we 
must put on a desperate face — 

" On reason build resolve, 
That column of true majesty in man " — 



loo Burns' Clarinda. 

or, as the same author finely says in another 
place — 

" Let thy soul spring up 
And lay strong hold for help on Him that made thee." 

I am yours, Clarinda, for life. Never be dis- 
couraged at all this. Look forward : in a few- 
weeks I shall be somewhere or other, out of the 
possibility of seeing you ; till then, I shall write 
you often, but visit you seldom. Your fame, 
your welfare, your happiness, are dearer to me 
than any gratification whatever. Be comforted, 
my love ! the present moment is the worst ; the 
lenient hand of time is daily and hourly either 
lightening the burden, or making us insensible 
to the weight. None of these friends — I mean 

Mr and the other gentleman — can hurt 

your worldly support ; and of their friendship, 
in a little time you will learn to be easy, and 
by -and -by to be happy without it. A decent 
means of livelihood in the world, an approving 
God, a peaceful conscience, and one firm trusty 
friend — can anybody that has these be said to 
be unhappy ? These are yours. 

To-morrow evening I shall be with you about 
eight, probably for the last time till I return to 



Letters. loi 

Edinburgh. In the meantime, should any of 
these two unlucky friends question you respect- 
ing me, whether I am the man^ I do not think 
they are entitled to any information. As to 
their jealousy and spying, I despise them. 

Adieu, my dearest Madam ! 

Sylvander. 



No. XXXI. 

To Clarinda. 

Glasgow, Monday Evenings Nine o^ clock. 
The attraction of love, I find, is in an inverse 
proportion to the attraction of the Newtonian 
philosophy. In the system of Sir Isaac, the 
nearer objects were to one another, the stronger 
was the attractive force. In my system, every 
milestone that marked my progress from 
Clarinda, awakened a keener pang of attach- 
ment to her. How do you feel, my love? Is 
your heart ill at ease ? I fear it. God forbid 
that these persecutors should harass that peace, 
which is more precious to me than my own. 
Be assured I shall ever think on you, muse on 
you, and in my moments of devotion, pray for 



102 Burns' Clarinda. 

you. The hour that you are not in my thoughts, 
" be that hour darkness ; let the shadows of 
death cover it ; let it not be numbered in the 
hours of the day ! " 

" When I forget the darling theme, 
Be my tongue mute ! my fancy paint no more ! 
And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat ! " 

I have just met with my old friend, the ship 
captain * — guess my pleasure : to meet you 
could alone have given me more. My brother 
William, too, the young saddler, has come to 
Glasgow to meet me ; and here are we three 
spending the evening. 

I arrived here too late to write by post ; but 
I'll wrap half-a-dozen sheets of blank paper 
together, and send it by the Fly, under the 
name of a parcel. You will hear from me 
next post-town. I would write you a longer 
letter, but for the present circumstances of my 
friend. 

Adieu, my Clarinda ! I am just going to 
propose your health by way of grace drink. 

Sylvander. 

* Mr Richard Brown. 



Letters, 103 

No. XXXII. 

To Clarinda. 

Kilmarnock, Friday [Feb. 22]. 
I WROTE you, my dear Madam, the moment 
I alighted in Glasgow. Since then I have not 
had opportunity ; for in Paisley, where I arrived 
next day, my worthy, wise friend Mr Pattison 
did not allow me a moment's respite. I was 
there ten hours ; during which time I was intro- 
duced to nine men worth six thousands ; five 
men worth ten thousands ; his brother, richly 
worth twenty thousands ; and a young weaver, 
who will have thirty thousands good when his 
father, who has no more children than the said 
weaver, and a Whig kirk, dies. Mr P. was bred 
a zealous Anti-burgher ; but during his widower- 
hood he has found their strictness incompatible 
with certain compromises he is often obliged to 
make with those powers of darkness — the devil, 
the world, and the flesh. . . . His only daughter, 
who, " if the beast be to the fore, and the 
branks bide hale," will have seven thousand 
pounds when her old father steps into the dark 
factory-office of eternity with his well-thrummed 



I04 Burns' Clarinda. 

web of life, has put him again and again in a 
commendable fit of indignation by requesting 
a harpsichord. "O these boarding-schools!" 
exclaims my prudent friend : " she was a good 
spinner and sewer till I was advised by her foes 
and mine to give her a year of Edinburgh ! " 

After two bottles more, my much-respected 
friend opened up to me a project — a legitimate 
child of Wisdom and Good Sense : 'twas no 
less than a long-thought-on and deeply-matured 
design, to marry a girl fully as elegant in her 
form as the famous priestess whom Saul con- 
sulted in his last hours, and who had been 
second maid of honour to his deceased wife. 
This, you may be sure, I highly applauded ; so 
I hope for a pair of gloves by-and-by. I spent 
the two bypast days at Dunlop House, with 
that worthy family to whom I was deeply in- 
debted early in my poetic career ; and in about 
two hours I shall present your "twa wee sarkies" 
to the little fellow. My dearest Clarinda, you 
are ever present with me ; and these hours, 
that drawl by among the fools and rascals of 
this world, are only supportable in the idea, 
that they are the forerunners of that happy 
hour that ushers me to "the mistress of my 



Letters. 1 05 

soul." Next week I shall visit Dumfries, and 
next again return to Edinburgh. My letters, 
in these hurrying dissipated hours, will be 
heavy trash ; but you know the writer. God 
bless you ! 

Sylvander. 

No. XXXIII. 
To Clarinda. 

Cumnock \Sunday\ March 2, 1788. 
I HOPE, and am certain, that my generous 
Clarinda will not think my silence, for now a 
long week, has been in any degree owing to 
my forgetfulness. I have been tossed about 
through the country ever since I wrote you ; 
and am here, returning from Dumfriesshire, at 
an inn, the post-office of the place, with just so 
long time as my horse eats his corn, to write 
you. I have been hurried with business and 
dissipation almost equal to the insidious decree 
of the Persian monarch's mandate, when he for- 
bade asking petition of God or man for forty 
days. Had the venerable prophet been as 
throng [busy] as I, he had not broken the 
decree, at least not thrice a-day. 



io6 Btirns' Clarinda. 

I am thinking my farming scheme will yet 
hold. A worthy, intelligent farmer, my father's 
friend and my own, has been with me on the 
spot : he thinks the bargain practicable. I am 
myself, on a more serious review of the lands, 
much better pleased with them. I won't mention 
this in writing to anybody but you and [Ainslie]. 
Don't accuse me of being fickle : I have the two 
plans of life before me, and I wish to adopt the 
one most likely to procure me independence. I 
shall be in Edinburgh next week. I long to 
see you : your image is omnipresent to me ; 
nay, I am convinced I would soon idolatrize it 
most seriously — so much do absence and memory 
improve the medium through which one sees the 
much-loved object. To-night, at the sacred hour 
of eight, I expect to meet you — at the Throne 
of Grace. I hope, as I go home to-night, to 
find a letter from you at the post-office in 
Mauchline. I have just once seen that dear hand 
since I left Edinburgh — a letter indeed which 
much affected me. Tell me, first of woman- 
kind ! will my warmest attachment, my sincerest 
friendship, my correspondence — will they be any 
compensation for the sacrifices you make for my 
sake? If they will, they are yours. If I settle 



Letters. 107 

on the farm I propose, I am just a day and a 
half's ride from Edinburgh. We will meet — 
don't you say " perhaps too often ! " 

Farewell, my fair, my charming poetess ! May 
all good things ever attend you ! 

I am ever, my dearest Madam, yours, 

Sylvander. 



No. XXXIV. 
Sylvander to Clarinda. 

\March 6, 1788.] 
I OWN myself guilty, Clarinda : I should 
have written you last week. But when you 
recollect, my dearest Madam, that yours of this 
night's post is only the third I have from you, 
and that this is the fifth or sixth I have sent 
to you, you will not reproach me, with a good 
grace, for unkindness. I have always some kind 
of idea not to sit down to write a letter, except 
I have time, and possession of my faculties, so 
as to do some justice to my letter ; which at 
present is rarely my situation. For instance, 
yesterday I dined at a friend's at some distance : 



io8 Burns^ Clarinda. 

the savage hospitality of this country spent me 
the most part of the night over the nauseous 
potion in the bowl. This day — sick — headache 
— low spirits — miserable — fasting, except for a 
draught of water or small beer. Now eight 
o'clock at night; only able to crawl ten minutes' 
walk into Mauchline, to wait the post, in the 
pleasurable hope of hearing from the mistress 
of my soul. 

But truce with all this ! When I sit down 
to write to you, all is happiness and peace. A 
hundred times a day do I figure you before 
your taper, your book or work laid aside as I 
get within the room. How happy have I been ! 
and how little of that scantling portion of time, 
called the life of man, is sacred to happiness, 
much less transport. 

I could moralize to-night like a death's-head. 

" Oh what is life, that thoughtless wish of all ! 
A drop of honey in a draught of gall." 

Nothing astonishes me more, when a little 
sickness clogs the wheels of life, than the 
thoughtless career we run in the hour of health. 
" None saith, Where is God, my Maker, that 
giveth songs in the night : who teacheth us 



Letters. 109 

more knowledge than the beasts of the field, 
and more understanding than the fowls of the 
air ? " 

Give me, my Maker, to remember Thee ! 
Give me to act up to the dignity of my nature ! 
Give me to feel " another's woe " ; and continue 
with me that dear loved friend that feels with 
mine ! 

The dignifying and dignified consciousness of 
an honest man, and the well-grounded trust in 
approving Heaven, are two most substantial 
foundations of happiness. . . . 

I could not have written a page to any 
mortal except yourself I'll write you by 
Sunday's post. Adieu! Goodnight! 

Sylvander. 



No. XXXV. 

Sylvander to Clarinda. 

MosSGlEL, March 7, 1788. 
Clarinda, I have been so stung with your 
reproach for unkindness — a sin so unlike me, a 
sin I detest more than a breach of the whole 



no Burits Clarinda. 

Decalogue, fifth, sixth, seventh, and ninth 
articles excepted — that I believe I shall not rest 
in my grave about it, if I die before I see you. 
You have often allowed me the head to judge 
and the heart to feel the influence of female 
excellence : was it not blasphemy then, against 
your own charms and against my feelings, to 
suppose that a short fortnight could abate my 
passion ? 

You, my love, may have your cares and 
anxieties to disturb you ; but they are the 
usual occurrences of life. Your future views are 
fixed, and your mind in a settled routine. 
Could not you, my ever dearest Madam, make 
a little allowance for a man, after long absence, 
paying a short visit to a country full of friends, 
relations, and early intimates ? Cannot you 
guess, my Clarinda, what thoughts, what cares, 
what anxious forebodings, hopes, and fears, 
must crowd the breast of the man of keen 
sensibility, when no less is on the tapis than his 
aim, his employment, his very existence through 
future life ? 

To be overtopped in anything else, I can 
bear ; but in the tests of generous love, I defy 
all mankind ! not even to the tender, the fond. 



Letters. 1 1 1 

the loving Clarinda ; she whose strength of 
attachment, whose melting soul, may vie with 
Eloise and Sappho ; not even she can overpay 
the affection she owes me ! 

Now that, not my apology, but my defence 
is made, I feel my soul respire more easily. 
I know you will go along with me in my 
justification : would to Heaven you could in my 
adoption, too ! I mean an adoption beneath 
the stars — an adoption where I might revel in 
the immediate beams of 

" She the bright sun of all her sex." 

I would not have you, my dear Madam, so 
much hurt at Miss Nimmo's coldness. 'Tis 
placing yourself below her, an honour she by 
no means deserves. We ought, when we wish 
to be economists in happiness — we ought, in 
the first place, to fix the standard of our own 
character; and when, on full examination, we 
know where we stand, and how much ground 
we occupy, let us contend for it as property ; 
and those who seem to doubt or deny us what 
is justly ours, let us either pity their prejudices 
or despise their judgment. I know, my dear, 
you will say this is self-conceit ; but I call it 



112 Burns' Clarinda. 

self-knowledge : the one is the overweening 
opinion of a fool, who fancies himself to be 
what he wishes himself to be thought ; the 
other is the honest justice that a man of sense, 
who has thoroughly examined the subject, owes 
to himself. Without this standard, this column 
in our own mind, we are perpetually at the 
mercy of the petulance, the mistakes, the pre- 
judices, nay, the very weakness and wickedness 
of our fellow-creatures. 

I urge this, my dear, both to confirm myself 
in the doctrine which, I assure you, I sometimes 
need, and because I know that this causes you 
often much disquiet. To return to Miss Nimmo. 
She is most certainly a worthy soul ; and 
equalled by very, very few in goodness of heart. 
But can she boast more goodness of heart than 
Clarinda ? Not even prejudice will dare to say 
so. For penetration and discernment, Clarinda 
sees far beyond her. To wit, Miss Nimmo dare 
make no pretence : to Clarinda's wit, scarce any 
of her sex dare make pretence. Personal 
charms, it would be ridiculous to run the 
parallel : and for conduct in life. Miss Nimmo 
was never called out, either much to do, or to 
suffer. Clarinda has been both ; and has per- 



Letters. 113 

formed her part, where Miss Nimmo would 
have sunk at the bare idea. 

Away, then, with these disquietudes ! Let 
us pray with the honest weaver of Kilbarchan, 
" Lord, send us a gude conceit o' oursel' ! " or 
in the words of the auld sang — 

" Who does me disdain, I can scorn them again. 
And I'll never mind any such foes." 

There is an error in the commerce of 
intimacy. . . . 

Happy is our lot, indeed, when we meet with 
an honest merchant, who is qualified to deal 
with us on our own terms ; but that is a rarity : 
with almost everybody we must pocket our 
pearls, less or more, and learn, in the old Scots 
phrase, "To gie sic like as we get." For this 
reason we should try to erect a kind of bank 
or storehouse in our own mind ; or, as the 
Psalmist says, "We should commune with our 
own hearts and be still." . . . 

I wrote you yesternight, which will reach you 
long before this can. I may write Mr Ainslie 
before I see him, but I am not sure. 

Farewell ! and remember 

Sylvander. 

H 



114 Burns' Clarinda. 

No. XXXVI. 

Sylvander to Clarinda. 

Monday Noon [March 17]. 

I WILL meet you to-morrow, Clarinda, as you 
appoint. My Excise affair is just concluded, 
and I have got my order for instructions : so 
far good. Wednesday night I am engaged to 
sup among some of the principals of the Excise, 
so can only make a call for you that evening ; 
but next day, I stay to dine with one of 
the Commissioners, so cannot go till Friday 
morning. 

Your hopes, your fears, your cares, my love, 
are mine ; so don't mind them. I will take you 
in my hand through the dreary wilds of this 
world, and scare away the ravening bird or 
beast that would annoy you. I saw Mary in 
town to-day, and asked her if she had seen you. 
I shall certainly bespeak Mr Ainslie, as you 
desire. 

Excuse me, my dearest angel, this hurried 
scrawl and miserable paper ; circumstances 
make both. Farewell till to-morrow. 

Sylvander. 



Letters. 115 



No. XXXVII. 

Sylvander to Clarinda. 

Tuesday Morning {March 18]. 
I AM just hurrying away to wait on the 
Great Man, Clarinda ; but I have more respect 
to my own peace and happiness than to set out 
without waiting on you ; for my imagination, 
Hke a child's favourite bird, will fondly flutter 
along with this scrawl, till it perch on your 
bosom. I thank you for all the happiness you 
bestowed on me yesterday. The walk — de- 
lightful ; the evening — rapture. Do not be 
uneasy to-day, Clarinda ; forgive me. I am in 
rather better spirits to-day, though I had but 
an indifferent night. Care, anxiety sat on my 
spirits ; and all the cheerfulness of this morning 
is the fruit of some serious, important ideas that 
lie, in their realities, beyond " the dark and the 
narrow house," as Ossian, prince of poets, says. 
The Father of Mercies be with you, Clarinda ! 
and every good thing attend you ! 

Sylvander. 



ii6 Bairns' Clarinda. 

No. XXXVIII. 
Sylvander to Clarinda. 

Wednesday Morning {.March 19]. 

Clarinda, will that envious night-cap hinder 
you from appearing at the window as I pass? 
" Who is she that looketh forth as the morning ; 
fair as the sun, clear as the moon, terrible as an 
army with banners ? " 

Do not accuse me of fond folly for this line ; 
you know I am a cool lover. I mean by these 
presents greeting, to let you to wit, that arch- 
rascal Creech has not done my business yester- 
night, which has put off my leaving town till 
Monday morning. To-morrow at eleven I 
meet with him for the last time ; just the hour 
I should have met far more agreeable company. 

You will tell me this evening whether you 

cannot make our hour of meeting to-morrow 

one o'clock. I have just now written Creech 

such a letter, that the very goose-feather in my 

hand shrunk back from the line, and seemed to 

say, " I exceedingly fear and quake ! " I am 

forming ideal schemes of vengeance. . . . 

Adieu, and think on 

Sylvander. 



Letters. li^ 

No. XXXIX. 
Sylvander to Clarinda. 

Friday^ Nine dclock^ Night {March 21]. 
I AM just now come in, and have read your 
letter. The first thing I did was to thank the 
divine Disposer of events, that He has had such 
happiness in store for me as the connexion I 
have with you. Life, my Clarinda, is a weary, 
barren path ; and woe be to him or her that 
ventures on it alone! For me, I have my 
dearest partner of my soul : Clarinda and I will 
make out our pilgrimage together. Wherever I 
am, I shall constantly let her know how I go on, 
what I observe in the world around me, and 
what adventures I meet with. Will it please 
you, my love, to get every week, or at least 
every fortnight, a packet, two or three sheets, 
full of remarks, nonsense, news, rhymes, and old 
songs? Will you open, with satisfaction and 
delight, a letter from a man who loves you, who 
has loved you, and who will love you to death, 
through death, and for ever ? Oh, Clarinda ! 
what do I owe to Heaven for blessing me with 
such a piece of exalted excellence as you ! I 
call over your idea, as a miser counts over his 



Ii8 Burns' Clarinda. 

treasure. Tell me, were you studious to please 
me last night ? I am sure you did it to 
transport. How rich am I who have such a 
treasure as you ! You know me ; you know 
how to make me happy ; and you do it most 
effectually. God bless you with 

" Long life, long youth, long pleasure, and a friend ! " 

To-morrow night, according to your own 
direction, I shall watch the window : 'tis the 
star that guides me to paradise. The great 
relish to all is, that Honour, that Innocence, 
that Religion, are the witnesses and guarantees 
of our happiness. " The Lord God knoweth," 
and perhaps " Israel he shall know," my love 
and your merit. Adieu, Clarinda ! I am going 
to remember you in my prayers. 

Sylvander. 

No. XL. 

To Clarinda. 

Madam, March 9, 1789. 

The letter you wrote me to Heron's carried 

its own answer in its bosom ; you forbade me to 

write you, unless I was willing to plead guilty 

to a certain indictment that you were pleased to 



Letters. 119 

bring against me. As I am convinced of my 
own innocence, and though conscious of high 
imprudence and egregious folly, can lay my 
hand on my breast and attest the rectitude of 
my heart, you will pardon me. Madam, if I do 
not carry my complaisance so far as humbly to 
acquiesce in the name of villain, merely out of 
compliment to your opinion, much as I esteem 
your judgment, and warmly as I regard your 
worth. 

I have already told you, and I again aver it, 
that at the period of time alluded to I was not 
under the smallest moral tie to Mrs Burns ; nor 
did I, nor could I, then know all the powerful 
circumstances that omnipotent necessity was 
busy laying in wait for me. When you call 
over the scenes that have passed between us, 
you will survey the conduct of an honest man, 
struggling successfully with temptations the 
most powerful that ever bese"- humanity, and 
preserving untainted honour in situations where 
the austerest virtue would have forgiven a fall ; 
situations that, I will dare to say, not a single 
individual of all his kind, even with half his 
sensibility and passion, could have encountered 
without ruin ; and I leave you to guess. Madam, 



120 Burns' Clarmda. 

how such a man is Hkely to digest an accusation 
of perfidious treachery. 

Was I to blame, Madam, in being the dis- 
tracted victim of charms which, I afifirm it, no 
man ever approached with impunity? Had I 
seen the least glimmering of hope that these 
charms could ever have been mine, or even had 
not iron necessity — but these are unavailing 
words. 

I would have called on you when I was in 
town — indeed, I could not have resisted it — but 
that Mr Ainslie told me that you were deter- 
mined to avoid your windows while I was in 
town, lest even a glance of me should occur in 
the street. 

When I have regained your good opinion, 
perhaps I may venture to solicit your friend- 
ship ; but, be that as it may, the first of her sex 
I ever knew shall always be the object of my 
warmest good wishes. R. B. 

No. XLI. 
Sylvander to Clarinda. 

February 1790 (?). 
I HAVE indeed been ill, Madam, the whole 
winter. An incessant headache, depression of 



Letters. 121 

spirits, and all the truly miserable consequences 
of a deranged nervous system, have made 
dreadful havoc of my health and peace. Add 
to all this a line of life into which I have lately 
entered obliges me to ride, on the average, at 
least 200 miles every week. However, thank 
Heaven, I am now greatly better in my 
health. . . . 

I cannot, will not, enter into extenuatory 
circumstances ; else I could show you how 
my precipitate, headlong, unthinking conduct 
leagued with a conjuncture of unlucky events 
to thrust me out of a possibility of keeping the 
path of rectitude to curse me, by an irrecon- 
cilable war between my duty and my nearest 
wishes, and to damn me with a choice only of 
different species of error and misconduct. 

I dare not trust myself further with this 
subject. The following song is one of my 
latest productions, and I send it you as I 
would do anything else, because it pleases 
myself 

[Here follows " My Lovely Nancy."] 



122 Burns^ Clarinda. 

No. XLII. 
Sylvander to Clarinda. 

[Burns had been to Edinburgh at the end of November 
and beginning of December, and had there seen Mrs 
M'Lehose. She had resolved to go to her worthless but 
repentant husband in Jamaica, and sailed in February 
1792.] 

I HAVE received both your last letters, 
Madam, and ought and would have answered 
the first long ago. But on what subject shall 
I write you? How can you expect a corre- 
spondent should write you when you declare 
that you mean to preserve his letters, with a 
view, sooner or later, to expose them in the 
pillory of derision and the rock of criticism? 
This is gagging me completely as to speaking 
the sentiments of my bosom ; else, Madam, I 
could perhaps too truly 

" Join grief with grief, and echo sighs to thine ! " 

I have perused your most beautiful but most 
pathetic poem ; do not ask me how often or 
with what emotions. You know that " I dare 
to j/«, but not to Her Your verses wring the 
confession from my inmost soul, that — I will 
say it, expose it if you please — that I have 



Letters. 123 

more than once in my life been the victim of 
a damning conjuncture of circumstances ; and 
that to see you must be ever 

" Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes." 
I have just, since I had yours, composed the 
following stanzas. Let me know your opinion 
of them. 

[Here are transcribed the lines beginning, "Sweet 
Sensibility, how charming," &c.] 



No. XLIII. 
To Clarinda. 

[Enclosing the " Lament of Mary, Queen of Scots," 
Burns wrote as follows :— ] 

Leadhills, Thursday Noon \Pcc. ii, 1791]. 
Such, my dearest Clarinda, were the words of 
the amiable but unfortunate Mary. Misfortune 
seems to take a peculiar pleasure in darting her 
arrows against " honest men and bonnie lasses." 
Of this you are too, too just a proof; but may 
your future be a bright exception to the remark. 
In the words of Hamlet — 

"Adieu, adieu, adieu ! Remember me." 

Sylvan DER. 



124 Burns' Clarinda. 

No. XLIV. 
To Clarinda. 

Dumfries \_Decejnber 15 (?), 1791]. 

I HAVE some merit, my ever dearest of women, 
in attracting and securing the honest heart of 
Clarinda. In her I meet with the most accom- 
plished of all womankind, the first of all God's 
works, and yet I, even I, have the good fortune 
to appear amiable in her sight. 

By the by, this is the sixth letter that I have 
written since I left you ; and if you were an 
ordinary being, as you are a creature very ex- 
traordinary — an instance of what God Almighty, 
in the plenitude of His power and the fulness 
of His goodness, can make ! — I would never 
forgive you for not answering my letters. 

I have sent your hair, a part of the parcel 
you gave me, with a measure, to Mr Brice, the 
jeweller, to get a ring done for me. I have 
likewise sent in the verses " On Sensibility," 
altered to — 

" Sensibility, how charming, 
Dearest Nancy, thou can tell," &c., 

to the editor of " Scots Songs," of which you 



Letters. 125 

have three volumes, to set to a most beautiful 

air — out of compliment to the first of women, 

my ever-beloved, my ever-sacred Clarinda. I 

shall probably write you to-morrow. In the 

meantime, from a man who is literally drunk 

accept and forgive ! 

R. B. 

No. XLV. 

To Clarinda. 

I SUPPOSE, my dear Madam, that by your 
neglecting to inform me of your arrival in 
Europe — a circumstance that could not be in- 
different to me, as indeed no occurrence relating 
to you can — you meant to leave me to guess 
and gather that a correspondence I once had 
the honour and felicity to enjoy is to be no 
more. Alas! what heavy-laden sounds are 
these — "No more!" The wretch who has never 
tasted pleasure has never known woe : what 
drives the soul to madness is the recollection 
of joys that are " no more ! " But this is not 
language to the world : they do not understand 
it. But come, ye few — the children of feeling 
and sentiment! — ye whose trembling bosom- 
chords ache to unutterable anguish as recol- 



126 Burns' Clarinda. 

lection gushes on the heart! — ye who are 
capable of an attachment keen as the arrows 
of Death, and strong as the vigour of immortal 
being — come ! and your ears shall drink a tale — 
But hush ! I must not, cannot, tell it ; agony is 
in the recollection, and frenzy in the recital ! 

But, Madam, to leave the paths that lead to 
madness, I congratulate your friends on your 
return; and I hope that the precious health, 
which Miss P. tells me is so much injured, is 
restored or restoring. . . . 

I present you a book : may I hope you will 
accept it? I daresay you will have brought 
your books with you. The fourth vol. of the 
"Scots Songs" is published. {^August 1792.] 
I will presume to send it you. Shall I hear 
from you? But first hear me. No cold language 
— no prudential documents : I despise advice 
and scorn control. If you are not to write such 
language, such sentiments, as you know I shall 
wish, shall delight to receive, I conjure you, by 
wounded pride, by ruined peace, by frantic dis- 
appointed passion, by all the many ills that 
constitute that sum of human woes, a broken 
heart ! ! ! to me be silent for ever. . . . 

R. B. 



Letters. 1 27 

No. XLVI. 

To Clarinda. 

Before you ask me why I have not written 
you, first let me be informed by you, how I shall 
write you ? "In friendship," you say ; and I 
have many a time taken up my pen to try an 
epistle of " friendship " to you, but it will not 
do ; 'tis like Jove grasping a popgun after hav- 
ing wielded his thunder. When I take up the 
pen, recollection ruins me. Ah, my ever-dearest 
Clarinda ! Clarinda ! What a host of memory's 
tenderest offspring crowd on my fancy at that 
sound ! But I must not indulge that subject ; 
you have forbid it. 

I am extremely happy to learn that your 
precious health is re-established, and that you 
are once more fit to enjoy that satisfaction in 
existence which health alone can give us. My 
old friend AinsHe has indeed been kind to you. 
Tell him, that I envy him the power of serving 
you. I had a letter from him a while ago, but 
it was so dry, so distant, so like a card to one of 
his clients, that I could scarce bear to read it, 
and have not yet answered it. He is a good, 



128 Burns' Clarinda. 

honest fellow, and can write a friendly letter, 
which would do equal honour to his head and 
his heart, as a whole sheaf of his letters which 
I have by me will witness ; and though Fame 
does not blow her trumpet at my approach now 
as she did then, when he first honoured me with 
his friendship, yet I am as proud as ever ; and 
when I am laid in my grave, I wish to be 
stretched at my full length, that I may occupy 
every inch of ground I have a right to. 

You would laugh were you to see me where I 
am just now. Would to Heaven you were here 
to laugh with me, though I am afraid that crying 
would be our first employment ! Here am I 
set, a solitary hermit, in the solitary room of a 
solitary inn, with a solitary bottle of wine by 
me, as grave and as stupid as an owl, but, like 
that owl, still faithful to my old song ; in con- 
firmation of which, my dear Mrs Mac, here is 
your good health ! May the hand-waled beni- 
sons o' Heaven bless your bonnie face ; and the 
wratch wha skellies at your welfare, may the 
auld tinkler deil get him, to clout his rotten 
heart ! Amen. 

You must know, my dearest Madam, that 
these now many years, wherever I am, in what- 



Letters. i 29 

ever company, when a married lady is called as 
a toast, I constantly give you ; but as your 
name has never passed my lips, even to my most 
intimate friend, I give you by the name of Mrs 
Mac. This is so well known among my acquaint- 
ances, that when any married lady is called for, 
the toast-master will say : " Oh, we need not 
ask him who it is : here's Mrs Mack ! " I have 
also, among my convivial friends, set on foot a 
round of toasts, which I call a round of Arcadian 
Shepherdesses — that is, a round of favourite 
ladies, under female names celebrated in ancient 
song ; and then you are my Clarinda. So, my 
lovely Clarinda, I devote this glass of wine to a 
most ardent wish for your happiness. 

In vain would Prudence, with decorous sneer, 
Point out a censuring world, and bid me fear : 
Above that world on wings of love I rise ; 
I know its worst, and can that worst despise. 

" Wronged, injured, shunned, unpitied, unredrest — 
The mocked quotation of the scorner's jest " — 
Let Prudence' direst bodements on me fall, 
Clarinda, rich reward ! o'erpays them all. 

I have been rhyming a little of late, but I do 
not know if they are worth postage. 
I 



i30 Burns' Clarinda. 

Tell me what you think of the following 
monody. 

The subject of the foregoing is a woman of 
fashion in this country,* with whom at one 
period 1 was well acquainted. By some scan- 
dalous conduct to me, and two or three other 
gentlemen here as well as me, she steered so 
far to the north of my good opinion, that I 
have made her the theme of several ill-natured 
things. . . . 

R. B. 



* Mrs Riddel. 



NOTES ON CLARINDA 
AND HER CORRESPONDENCE. 



Notes on the 
Clarinda Correspondence. 

By John Muir, F.S.A. Scot. 



In the letter with which he opens his cele- 
brated correspondence with Clarinda, Burns 
mentions some lines of his which he commends 
in a style so unwonted when speaking of his 
own work, that we cannot but regret that they 
have not been preserved. He writes, December 

3, ^7^7 :— 

"Our worthy friend, in her usual pleasant 
way, rallied me a good deal on my new 
acquaintance, and in the humour of her ideas 
I wrote some lines, which I enclose you, as 
I think they have a good deal of poetic merit ; 
and Miss Nimmo tells me you are not only a 
critic but a poetess. Fiction, you know, is the 
native region of poetry ; and I hope you will 
pardon my vanity in sending you the bagatelle 
as a tolerable off-hand y^//-^Vjs^;V/." 

Clarinda replied, December 8, 1787 : — 



134 Burns' Clarinda. 

" Your lines were truly poetical ; give me all 
you can spare. Not one living has a higher 
relish for poetry than I have ; and my reading 
everything of the kind makes me a tolerable 
judge. Ten years ago such lines from such a 
hand would have half turned my head. Perhaps 
you thought it might have done so even j/et, 
and wisely premised that ' fiction was the 
native region of poetry.' Read the enclosed, 
which I scrawled just after reading yours. Be 
sincere, and own that, whatever merit it has, it 
has not a line resembling poetry." 

Clarinda's lines in reply to those of Burns 
seem not to have been preserved. 

In the fifth letter from Burns to Mrs 
M'Lehose, and the first letter in which the fair 
correspondent is described Clarinda by the poet, 
who signs himself Sylvander, he refers to a short 
letter, which has also been lost, accompanying 
some impromptu verses. In that letter the poet 
very probably explained the reason for using the 
Arcadian appellations ; but it is just possible 
Mrs M'Lehose was the first to sign herself 
Clarinda, and that the poet followed suit by 
adopting Sylvander as his nam de guen^e. On 
December 28, 1787, he writes : — 



Notes. 135 

" I beg your pardon, my dear ' Clarinda,' for 
the fragment scrawl I sent you yesterday. I 
really don't know what I wrote." 

" Yesterday " would be the 27th of December; 
but the letter from the poet immediately pre- 
ceding the one from which our extract is made, 
is dated Thursday, 20th December. 

Clarinda, writing under date January 3, 1788, 
says : — 

"I got your lines: they are * in kind!' I 
can't but laugh at my presumption in pretending 
to send my poor ones to you ! but it was to 
amuse myself." 

Here, again, remarks Mr W. Scott Douglas, 
the lines of Burns have been lost through 
some unaccountable remissness on the part of 
his correspondent. But, indeed, when scraps of 
the bard's handwriting grew invaluable, Clarinda 
became the prey of covetous collectors. 

These notes may be appropriately brought 
to a conclusion by a few remarks on the mis- 
readings of Burns's manuscripts to be noticed 
in collating the originals with the printed letters 
given in the Clarinda correspondence. 

In the letter assigned to December 20, 1787, 
" I cannot positively say " has been misprinted 



136 Burns' Clarinda, 

" I cannot possibly say " ; " something of 
honour" has been altered to "something like 
honour " ; and " a vague infant idea " to " a 
faint idea " ; while inverted commas have been 
inserted after, instead of before, " death," in 
" death without benefit of clergy." 

In another letter, dated February 20, 1788, 
" concubinage " is represented by asterisks, and 
" hinted at " has been substituted for " insisted 
on." " Good things " should be in italics. 

One other letter of the series, assigned to 
January 29, 1788, first printed by Stewart in 
1802, should be dated at the top "Tuesday 
Morn," and " Love " should be substituted for 
" Clarinda " in the first line. The MS. is de- 
fective at the end, the last word being " hurry," 
as printed. 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 



In Edinburgh "Sixty Years Since.' 

By James Adams, M.D., Glasgow. 



{From Glasgow Daily Mail^ I'jth Atigiist 1S95.) 
Printed by permission of the Author. 

" Ah, did you once see Shelley plain, 
And did he stop and speak to you. 
And did you speak to him again ? 
How strange it seems, and new." 

" Oh yes, I knew the Duke of Wellington," 
said one of " the masses." " Well, we hadn't 
much talk ; for he was riding on horseback, and 
I was walking in the middle of the road, and — 
yes — he damned me to get out of the way. Oh, 
he was a big, brave man, and very easy in his 
manners." 

By how many has it been regarded as a dis- 
tinction or a memory worth recalling that he 
has shaken hands with O'Connell or Gladstone, 



138 Burns' Clarinda. 

hobnobbed with Pritchard the poisoner, or 
" rubbed shouthers wi' Burns." For he can say 
better than his neighbour whether they were 
tall, thin or squat, fair or dark, old or young, 
pleasant or grim of visage. Very trivial are 
such particulars, but they fill in lights or 
shadows of an otherwise imperfect sketch, which 
no mere portrait-painter's brush can give. Thus, 
I have never been able to see in my " mind's 
eye " the everyday aspect of Burns so well as 
through the presentment given in Sir Walter 
Scott's reminiscence of one meeting. And I 
never, without having my conception blurred, 
can look upon that commonplace map of Burns' 
features delineated in the cheap copies of the 
familiar Nasmyth portrait (not his full-length 
picture) which a loyal Burnsite has termed 
" that wishy-washy sheep-like face," but with a 
conviction that, if the striped vest with collar 
and coat with broad lapels were removed, and 
the face of any stout man of about twenty-eight 
years substituted, it would be a case of " take 
your choice." It is stated that Disraeli would 
not believe the oath of a man who could declare 
he preferred dry to sweet champagne ; and I 
have similar disbelief of the person who pro- 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 139 

fesses to see in the frequent tea-tray portraits 
of Burns, the characteristic man, so instantly 
cognoscible in caricatures even of Napoleon, 
Gladstone, Bismarck, and such notabilities. 
" Burns' features," says Sir W. Scott, " are re- 
presented in Mr Nasmyth's picture, but to me 
it conveys the idea that they are diminished as 
if seen in perspective, . . . there was a strong 
expression of sense and shrewdness in all his 
lineaments. . . . The eye was large, and of a 
dark cast, which glowed (I say literally glowed) 
when he spoke with feeling or interest. I 
never saw such another eye in a human head, 
and he rewarded me with a look and a word, 
which, although of mere civility, I then received, 
and still recollect with very great pleasure." 
Such is Scott's record of the impression made 
on him, a lad of fifteen, when he met Burns in 
a company "where youngsters sate silent and 
listened." 

Referring to Clarinda, it has been long known 
to some of my intimate friends that I passed an 
entire evening in a social party with that lady, 
when I was of sufficient age to observe, and 
they have often urged on me, as one of the 
very few surviving links between the era of 



140 Burns' Clarinda. 

Burns and the present, that I should narrate 
that experience, which, however trivial or plainly 
told, cannot fail to be interesting, because re- 
lating to an individual who occupied so much 
of the thoughts and pen of Burns. But so little 
of a story have I to tell, that it is with 
much misgiving I have yielded to persistent 
insistence. 

It chanced in Edinburgh (my birthplace) that, 
when more than half-way through my "teens," 
and at the beginning of my medical curriculum, 
I formed a temporary intimacy with a much 
older fellow-student, who, beyond any individual 
I have ever known, was stuffed with Scottish 
songs, stories, and drolleries, as full as is a 
linnet with melodious impulse. He resided with 
his parents at the Calton Hill, in a little by- 
street which branched off to the left from the 
east end of Waterloo Place, just where that 
main thoroughfare reaches the Calton Hill. My 
friend invited me to a small evening party, 
where he assured me I would have a "bellyful 
of Scottish song," that being, as he knew, my 
weakness. It was no juvenile or dancing affair, 
but a company of about a dozen middle-aged 
individuals — decent tradesmen, with their wives 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 141 

and other relatives — and I was the youngest 
person present. There was a supper, at which 
port and sherry in decanters were on the table, 
but scarcely touched ; and whisky toddy was 
served with the viands. Song, toast, sentiment, 
and story were the order of the evening, con- 
tributed by all in rotation under the option of 
drinking a glass of salt and water, placed in 
readiness, but on this occasion left untouched. 
There was present a chirpy old lady, who, from 
subsequent information, I know must have been 
about seventy-five years of age, but it was a 
considerable time afterwards I learned that in 
her an angel had entertained me unawares ; and 
that the " Mrs M'Lehose," with whom I shook 
hands and interchanged ordinary civilities dur- 
ing the evening, was the far-famed "Clarinda, 
mistress of the soul," of Burns. It was evident 
that she was an intimate friend, and highly re- 
garded by the household. My friend, the son 
of our host, whispered to me early in the even- 
ing that she was a next-door neighbour, " a real 
game old lady," and an old sweetheart of Burns ; 
but he did not further enlighten me ; and at the 
moment I gave her little more consideration than 
I did others present, of all of whom I retain 



142 Bur7ts^ Clarinda. 

quite as vivid a recollection. The company was 
what many might consider very commonplace. 
Our host was a respectable master tailor ; one 
of the ladies a prosperous ladies' milliner — a 
fact impressed on me during a discussion on 
bonnets, then of a coal-scuttle shape, and made 
of Leghorn straw, both of which peculiarities, 
she confidently affirmed, would never be out 
of fashion ; a taciturn ship captain from Leith, 
with his sister, a lackadaisical, old-maidish 
damsel, bedecked with numerous thin corkscrew 
curls ; a hard-featured schoolmaster, or student's 
"grinder" in classics and mathematics; a coarse- 
mannered, boisterous master baker ; while a few 
others, more vaguely recollected, made up the 
company. To many the songs now before my 
retrospection may be familiar, but to me the 
musical part of the proceedings was most 
gratifying, some of the songs being heard by 
me for the first time. Indeed, I have a much 
more perfect recollection of the songs than of 
the conversation. The sentimental young lady 
sang " Alice Gray," and the " Meeting of the 
Waters " ; her brother, " The Carse o' Gowrie " ; 
the baker, " The Auld Man's Mear's Deid," and 
" The Haughs of Cromdale," both of which he 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 143 

gave with a " birr " and intensity of feeling that 
seemed to thrill him to the soul. The school- 
master sang " Tak' your auld Cloak about ye," 
and " O Nanny, wilt thou gang wi' me," with a 
sweetness, tenderness, and humour that irradi- 
ated his countenance and showed how little 
one's outer aspect may correspond with the 
inner nature. Indeed, often as I have heard 
these songs, I have never since been so im- 
pressed, and all the more because his outer 
man seemed so rigidly severe. The ladies' 
milliner, a jolly -featured stout lady, with a 
deep contralto voice, excited our admiring 
merriment by the petulant girlish manner in 
which she sang " I won't be a Nun," which 
begins, I think — 

" Now is it not a pity, such a pretty girl as I 
Should be sent into a Nunnery, to pine away and die ; 
But I won't be a Nun— I shan't be a Nun," &c. &c. 

The plaudits she elicited would in a concert- 
room have meant a determined encore, and 
therefore with little pause she gave us, in 
great contrast, a very pathetic rendering of 
" Her eyes with her pale hands are shaded." 
I was much taken aback for the moment when 



144 Burns^ Clarindd, 

she concluded and (with scarce an interval) 
abruptly called upon me for a song, for it was 
a privilege of the last singer to have " the call " 
for the next. I, however, gave, and doubtless 
in my very best style con amove con spirito, my 
pet song, " She says she lo'es me best of a' " ; 
and I have often regretted I did not take note 
of Clarinda's face as she listened to almost the 
only song of Burns' that was sung that evening. 
A fount of memories must surely have been 
opened. Of two songs, one a solo, the other 
a chorus, I have a very special recollection, as 
they were both heard by me for the first time — 
indeed of the latter I should say, the only time, 
although I have since been told that it is well 
enough known. These two songs brought Mrs 
M'Lehose conspicuously under my observation. 
The solo was contributed by my student- friend, 
evidently a favourite with Clarinda, who seemed 
to relish his pawky drolleries and broad humour 
much more than the ambitious efforts of some 
others of the company. 

And here I have found myself almost uncon- 
sciously, or rather unavoidably, drifted into 
details of this to me very memorable evening, 
because they illustrate, and were in some respects 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 145 

characteristic of, middle-class social gatherings 
of the Edinburgh of that day, or "sixty years 
since." There was no "wet blanket" in the 
company to damp the current of song, recitation, 
toast, and anecdote, which, with little inter- 
mission, incited animated conversation. Indeed, 
I never formed one of a group of more keenly 
appreciative listeners and commentators. The 
solo to which I refer was " My Wife has ta'en 
the Gee," and the boyish Lord-Rosebery cast 
of my friend's countenance as he enacted the 
henpecked husband deprecating the sulks of his 
wife, contrasted so much with his enactment of 
a married man that the effect was irresistibly 
ludicrous. The merriment became contagious, 
and the company was convulsed with sympa- 
thetic laughter. Clarinda in particular went off 
into frequent " kinks," ejaculating now and 
again, " Oh, stop him ! take him away ! put him 
out ! " while he perforce made occasional pauses, 
gravely resuming as an interval of quiet per- 
mitted. When he finished, she declared, while 
breathlessly panting and wiping her eyes, that 
" she did not know what he deserved for causing 
her to make such an object of herself." I re- 
member being strongly impressed with the old 
K 



146 Burns' Clarinda. 

lady's vivacious manner and lively spirits, so 
rare in one of her advanced years. 

As " the night drave on wi' sangs and clatter," 
and toasts were being drunk, the ladies approv- 
ing by sipping modestly at their small glasses 
duly kept charged from big " rummers " by the 
beau selected by each lady for that duty, the 
gentlemen showed their disposition to "let the 
toast pass" as "an excuse for the glass," by 
occasionally crying "clean caup out," and de- 
monstrating by turning their glass upside down 
that it had been fairly emptied. Mrs M'Lehose, 
although she did not contribute solos, joined in 
the choruses with the youngest, and took her 
turn in proposing toasts and sentiments. These 
were varied, being personal, general, and some 
more homely than polished, as " May ne'er waur 
be amang us," " Our noble selves," " Thumpin' 
luck and fat weans," &c. Clarinda's first toast 
tickled very much our sense of humour. Look- 
ing round on the expectant company to be 
assured that all were charged, she proposed in 
impressive tone, " Our foes " — carrying her glass 
to her lips, but pausing as if from an after- 
thought while the company waited in puzzled 
suspense, she sharply added, " Short shoes and 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 147 

corny toes," and took off her glass with a smack. 
This, of course, was rapturously applauded, and 
her health drunk " clean caup out." One of the 
chorus songs, which included " Blythe, blythe, 
and merry are we," I heard, or rather saw, per- 
formed for the first and, indeed, only time, al- 
though it is not so rare as I long supposed. 
The company were called to their feet by him 
who for the nonce acted as leader or " fugle- 
man," viz., the baker aforesaid, and we were 
instructed to follow and imitate him exactly. 
He stepped a pace behind his chair, and chanted 
a doggerel lilt with corresponding gestures — 

" A' your right hands in, an' a' your left hands out, 
Gie yoursel's a skelp, an' turn ye round about. 

Chorus— 
An' hey for Ronald Macdonald,and ho for Ronald Macdhu, 
An' hey for Ronald Macdonald ; we'll a' get roarin' fu' ! " 

Whereupon all, with one hand elevated in front 
and one extended behind, slapped our thighs, 
wheeled and turned vigorously, coming back to 
precision, as soldiers do at "present arms." Some- 
times our fugleman directed " fore ends in " and 
" back ends out," " noses in " and " lang tongues 
out": the wheeling, singing, and skelping giving 



148 Burns^ Clarinda. 

us all an exhilarating variety from the monotony 
of a long sitting, equal to that of Sir Roger 
de Coverley, or other spirited country dance. 
Clarinda sang, postured, skelped, and wheeled 
as vigorously as the foremost, and clearly with 
as much enjoyable abandon as she could have 
done sixty years previously, when amid her 
school companions she danced " Here we go by 
jingo-ring, and round the merry ma-tanzie," or 
any other of the out-of-door sports of Scottish 
girls. 

We are all but children of a larger growth, and 
man is ever the same in his modes of thought 
and incentives to action. The Modern, trained 
in " dancing - school deportment," who may be 
reading with disdainful smile my reminiscences 
of the free and easy habits I am describing of 
middle-class Edinburgh society sixty years since, 
must be reminded of the saying that if you 
"scratch the Russian you will find the Tartar"; 
that if you strip the toga from the man you will 
reveal the pinafore of the boy. These sayings 
are true at all times, and equally true that " a 
little nonsense now and then is relished by the 
wisest men." " Leave off," said a great man 
when caught at some boy-play, " leave off, for 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 149 

here comes a fool,'' that fool being a Court 
functionary of many titles. 

And here I admit that I had many misgivings 
that in venturing to pen my " Glimpse of 
Clarinda," there was risk of making sport for the 
Philistines, and grating the teeth of those who 
can only contemplate Burns' heroines through 
roseate curtains of the poet's imagination, if I 
described her, the inspirer of " Sensibility, how 
charming," while engaged in a game of romps, 
where refinement, modish tinsel, and varnish 
seemed to have no place. But in contrasting the 
manners of Clarinda's bygone time with those 
of the present, I think there is little to be noted 
of material change save variation or " marking 
time," as soldiers do while actively moving but 
not advancing. There has been no real progress 
in refinement since her day. The usages of a 
hundred or a hundred and fifty years back of the 
best Scotch society, to which Burns had occasional 
access, he has indicated in a letter describing his 
visit to a country mansion, where he with other 
guests and the young ladies of the family played 
"high jinks" in the drawing-room, "flying at 
Bab at the Bowster " and other romping games 
till early in the morning. His intercourse with 



150 Burns^ Clarinda. 

male society — with the Crochallan Club in Edin- 
burgh — the dining parties at country gentlemen's 
houses (as illustrated in Sir W. Scott's " Guy 
Mannering," wherein the frolics of Councillor 
Pleydell with his brother lawyers in Edinburgh 
are recorded), show that even the usages of 
middle-class life in the Edinburgh of sixty years 
ago compare not unfavourably with those of the 
sister country then or now. " There is a deal of 
human natur* about," we are told by that astute 
philosopher, Sam Slick. In his " Experiences 
of a Barrister's Life" (1882), Serjeant Ballantine 
refers to his pupilage in the early part of the 
present century, and tells us that in London, 
" vice clothed in its most repulsive garb stalked 
publicly through the streets ; . . . there was an 
atmosphere of coarseness and slang, and even in 
private society toasts were given and conversa- 
tion tolerated that would now shock the least 
refined ; . . . and songs of a degrading and 
filthy character were sung. . . . Most of my 
readers will remember a scene described by 
Thackeray in his novel of ' The Newcomes,' 
referring to this subject, which is far more 
graphic and powerful than any I can attempt." 
If we seek evidence in support of Serjeant 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 151 

Ballantine's belief in a better state of present 
things, what do we find ? We need only look 
at the current periodical press — whether of the 
masses or classes is immaterial. I take up a 
London weekly journal called Modern Society, 
which professedly holds the mirror up to nature, 
and has for its motto, " Society sayings and 
doings " — the sayings and doings of one week 
being nearly a repetition of the last, and that 
the counterpart of the next. In an issue of July 

1894, with reference to "Lady B 's dance," 

the editor of Society remarks : " What a relief 
it is to every one when there are few boys {i.e., 
young gentlemen]. . . . One of the most 
objectionable habits of ' boydom ' of the present 
day is the habit of gathering in groups at the 
supper table, and relating stories which are only 
fit for the smoking room, quite regardless of the 
presence of ladies." Here this censor of a com- 
munity that has a Royal Court for its centre, 
suggests that habits and conversation that are 
everywhere degrading and unfit for gentlemen 
and ladies, are nevertheless to be tolerated if 
reserved " for the smoking - room." Quis cus- 
todiet ipsos custodes? See also the writings of 
George Moore or Zola, characterised by the 



152 Bums' Clarinda. 

Examiner as fit objects for being burned by the 
common hangman. Surely there is no need for 
me to excuse the revelry of that evening when I 
had my glimpse of Clarinda ! In fancy, never- 
theless, I hear whisperings of " Vulgar," " In- 
decorous," and similar murmurs. 

But in modern social habits there is a poverty 
of resources in promoting hilarity, and much 
therefore to be said in extenuation of that spirit 
of " gamesomeness," or kindly sympathy, that 
links us in active movements on a broad and 
general basis where all can personally join. It 
is this impulse of "human natur'" that sets a 
crowd of students singing " Pour out the Rhine 
Wine," when mugs of small beer sparkle on the 
board. It is this which incites immense political 
assemblies of city aldermen, merchants, and 
members of Parliament, to hail with harmonious 
welcome the patrician features of a Gladstone, 
the far-from-jolly countenance of a Beaconsfield, 
or perky phiz of a Chamberlain, by joining in 
the festive hymn, " He's a jolly good fellow," 
Despite the anachronism of " fellow," I can recall 
having joined lustily in thus acclaiming a former 
hostess, a benevolent, smiling old lady, and seal- 
ing pledges of hearty goodwill, with " three times 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 153 

three and a tiger." I discriminate widely between 
such innocent demonstrations of social glee and 
that " fascination for the unclean," indicated by 
Serjeant Ballantine and the editor of Modern 
Society. Naturally the soul repeats to itself all 
that is beautiful, or all that seems so. A writer, 
reader, or conversationalist writes, reads, and 
speaks of what he likes — of what is to his taste. 
And there is undeniably a strain in the taste of 
some men and women which enjoys the idea of 
temptation and of evil pleasures, even while 
resolving and holding on by his or her own 
rectitude. As there was no sign of evil proclivity 
in the social party I have described, I do not 
look back with any apologetic feeling for myself 
or my company in recalling the cheap and 
cheery " high jinks " in which I participated some 
sixty years ago with Clarinda. 

I have never been able to blend my reminis- 
cence of Clarinda with the familiar silhouette, 
in which she is pleasingly depicted, at the age of 
about thirty years (as I guess), in "full voluptuous 
but not o'er-grown bulk," decked with graceful, 
gauzy head-dress. I saw her a shrunken old 
woman, about five feet one inch in height, her 
head surmounted with a toppling, stiff, bunchy 



154 Burns' Clarinda. 

" mob " cap, reminding me of old Mother Shipton 
and of the refrain of a Hit I often heard crooned 
over by an old nursemaid to the tune of " High- 
land Laddie" — 

" O what shall I do for starch and blue 
For my high Caul Cap— for my high Caul Cap," &c. 

It is true there are few of us who recognise 
ourselves or our nearest friends in portraits taken 
at five or ten years of age, when contrasted 
with one some forty years thereafter. In recent 
numbers of the Strand Magazine I saw a series 
of portraits of individuals portrayed from their 
infancy up till the present day ; and among 
them such notables as Disraeli, Bismarck, Patti, 
Bernhardt, &c., and surely contrasts could not 
be more dissimilar or less cognoscible. Of 
Clarinda's lively vivacity and graceful manner 
I have a very clear impression, because asso- 
ciated with a large lace shawl that floated from 
her shoulders and waved gracefully while she was 
gyrating in the " Ronald Macdhu " chorus, in 
singing which, notwithstanding the chorus, no 
one got " roarin' fu'." 

Little doubt it is because of some disillusion- 
ising personal accompaniments — such as snuff- 
taking, to which she was addicted — that I do 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 155 

not participate in the extravagant laudation 
bestowed by some on the Sylvander and 
Clarinda correspondence ; nor do I share the 
feeling which some Burns critics evince in re- 
viewing that relation, or their indiscriminating 
apportionment of blame because of his conse- 
cutive association with Highland Mary, Jean 
Armour, and Clarinda. He could not marry 
Mary, for his liaison with Jean was " the clash 
of the haill country side," and as such, no 
doubt, was well known to Mary. But he could 
philander and flirt as " a free bachelor " amid 
" the banks and braes and streams around the 
Castle of Montgomery," for the ethics of humble 
country life were not more exacting than those 
of the so-called better classes. It is unprofitable 
to speculate from the meagre, verifiable facts 
known what kind of wife Highland Mary would 
have proved, for we know scarce anything of 
her but what Burns tells us, although we love to 
believe his conception. We cannot, therefore, 
speculate with regrets, inasmuch as " fell death's 
untimely frost, that nipped his flow'r sae early," 
left Burns doubly a widower — by death from 
Mary, while her own resolve had widowed him 
from Jean. 



156 Burns^ Clarinda. 

It cannot be denied that Burns was sincere in 
his admiration for Clarinda, which even he could 
not find words to adequately express in almost 
daily efforts, during their few weeks (about ten) 
of epistolary correspondence, and the few — 
not numerous — personal meetings. Through- 
out their short association he lived a lifetime of 
poetically ardent conceptions, and during the 
last eight days he was, he tells us, "literally 
crazed." For when Burns fell in love, as he so 
frequently did, "he liked to put his strength to it," 
as the Irishman said when excusing himself for 
sleeping twenty-four hours at a stretch. But after 
eight days' absence from Clarinda's immediate 
association, he did not at any time seek its re- 
newal ; not, I believe, because of any revulsion 
of feeling, but because of the sight of his truly 
loved Jean Armour, and because of her protesta- 
tions that he had been misinformed regarding 
her real sentiments towards him. The renewed 
meetings, and Jean's assurances, evoked the real 
passion which had perhaps slumbered, but had 
ever been cherished, for the woman who, till his 
latest hour, continued to be his " Jean." I doubt, 
indeed, if Burns, until this critical time, ever 
fully understood, or seriously analysed, the 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 157 

nature of his regard for and his relations to- 
wards Clarinda, in which there was so much 
more of the intellectual than of the animal that 
usually predominated in him, as we are assured 
by his brother Gilbert. For no sooner was he 
outside Edinburgh, and removed from Clarinda's 
immediate presence — no sooner did he rejoin 
the long and always cherished object of that 
real passion — no sooner was he assured by his 
Jean that, despite her forced renunciation, she 
loved him as heretofore — no sooner did he learn 
from her family that the obstacles previously 
interposed were swept aside in view of his im- 
proved fortunes and rising social position, than 
he hastened to renew the broken link by a 
second and more formal marriage under Church 
sanction ; and thus he broke for ever from the 
craze of " infirm resolves," which for some time 
after his temporary estrangement from Jean 
Armour had characterised his actions in relation 
to her. He now saw clearly that the happiness 
or misery of a much-loved and much-trusting 
woman was in his hands — that immediate 
decision was imperative, and some discredit 
unavoidable, but least discredit to those he had 
unwisely involved, if he accepted for himself the 



158 Burns' Clarinda. 

larger share ; and he then resolutely selected 
that path which duty and long-enduring affec- 
tion alike indicated. And Clarinda was there- 
after avoided by him, but she continued to be 
tenderly recollected, respected, and admired. 
" Had Burns deserted her (Jean Armour), he 
had merely been a heartless villain," says Pro- 
fessor Wilson. " In making her his lawful 
wedded wife, he did no more than any other 
man, deserving the name of man, in the same 
circumstances would have done ; and had he not, 
he would have walked in shame before men, and 
in fear and trembling before God." 

He reaped the reward of an honest resolve in 
his calm domestic hearth, and did the best that 
the circumstances allowed ; and the best for, and 
by Clarinda ; who, although in many respects 
" a charming woman," showed in her brief rela- 
tions with Burns that " charming women are apt 
to have wills of their own " — a will with which 
that of the poet would assuredly have clashed, 
as it never did with that of his evenly-minded 
Jean. It should, therefore, be matter of con- 
gratulation that it was never of his much-loved 
respected wife, Jean Armour, but only of Clarinda, 
that Burns spoke when he referred to her as " a 



A Glimpse of Clarinda. 159 

ci-devant goddess of mine," and to whom he 
wrote, " But, by heavens, madam, I will not be 
bullied." And those who lament the Sylvander 
and Clarinda correspondence may take com- 
fort, despite the poetic " heart-wrung tears and 
warring sighs and groans," that all happened for 
the best ; and that the end fitly crowned the 
whole. 

Some weeks after the meeting I have endea- 
voured to describe, and during which I had that 
glimpse of Clarinda which has aided my judg- 
ment of her character, I met casually the school- 
master, and in the gossip that followed I learned 
much that made the evening more remarkable, 
and riveted on my memory some of the details. 
" Ay," he said, with a tenderly regretful smile 
as we parted, " it was indeed a sunny blink " — 

"It was but ae night o' our lives, 
And wha wad grudge though it were twa?" 



The Real Clarinda. 

By Peter Ross, LL.D., Author of "The Scot in 
America," &c. &c. 



The loves of Burns are among the most in- 
teresting studies in the career of that most gifted 
of men. His love passages were so many, and 
had such an influence in shaping the events and 
fortunes of his life, that we must study them, 
patiently and thoroughly, to understand his 
character and much of the apparent weakness 
and carelessness which came over him at times ; 
and to discover how a being so wondrously 
endowed could exhibit so many peculiar incon- 
sistencies in his mental make up. It is not 
going beyond the authentic facts which we have 
concerning that life of thirty-seven years, to say 
that it was mainly directed, controlled, and in- 
fluenced, and to a very great extent inspired, by 
its love for the society of the sex opposite to its 
own. The peculiar thing about the love passages 
of Burns is that they all continued to preserve for 
him a niche in the hearts of those who won his 



The Real Clarinda. i6i 

affections long after each reign was over, no matter 
what changes afterward took place in their lives, 
their conditions, their circumstances. Burns was 
his mother's favourite as a boy, and until the 
close of her long life he had the dearest place in 
her heart. Jean Armour, in her years of widow- 
hood, seemed only, as time sped on, to live in 
the hope of being again united to him for whom 
she had once sacrificed all, and who had raised 
her, a peasant girl, to a place among the most 
noted women of the world ; and Clarinda, with 
the weight of eighty years of life — a life which 
early was clouded with sorrow — remembered 
keenly, yet affectionately, the incidents of her 
love passage with the poet till the last. 

The biographers and critics of Burns treat the 
Clarinda love episode in a rather peculiar fashion. 
Some of them barely mention it ; others do not 
seem able to understand it exactly. Robert 
Chambers, the best of them all, seemingly has 
suspicions that it was very wrong, very indis- 
creet altogether ; and gravely moralises con- 
cerning it at intervals, — a course which was not 
very usual with him. He does not exactly 
assert that the love passage had any illicit 
details ; he presents the case as fully as pos- 
L 



1 62 Burns' Clarinda. 

sible, and renders a verdict of not proven. Scott 
Douglas, by implication rather than assertion, 
would have us believe that the love was not 
altogether innocent. Hately Waddell roundly 
denounces " Clarinda," and says in effect that 
" she was no better than she should be." Blackie 
thinks the interlude perfectly innocent. Prin- 
cipal Shairp does not discuss the nature of the 
intimacy, but condemns the artificial style of 
Burns's letters, and is disposed to frown upon the 
woman. Lockhart calls the passage " a little 
romance." The others are more or less non- 
committal, or unjust, or supercilious. The in- 
cident has been treated in a really critical 
fashion only by Chambers, and, as we have said, 
he did not express an opinion with any definite- 
ness either way. But he really sums up all that 
can be said truthfully on the subject from the 
point of one who believes in the existence of 
something more than mere words. The other 
side is stated, by one who evidently never con- 
ceived that there was anything in the friend- 
ship that was not in every way commendable, in 
the little book on Clarinda issued in 1843 by her 
grandson. 

It is a significant fact, we think, that none of 



The Real Clarinda. 163 

Clarinda's friends believed that her relations 
with Burns were anything but what might be 
perfectly proper between a married woman on 
the one hand and a warm personal friend on the 
other. Edinburgh, at the time the episode took 
place, was little better than a big village, where 
the people revelled in gossip, where scandal was 
always a timely topic, and each morsel acquired 
new importance as it came from the lips of a 
new whisperer. If the relations between Burns 
and Clarinda had been such as to afford any 
room for doubt, or for ill-natured suspicion, some- 
thing of it would undoubtedly have reached the 
ears of Clarinda's kinsman and benefactor. Lord 
Craig, one of the Judges of the Court of Session. 
But until his death, in 181 3, that upright and 
amiable man continued to the lady his kindly 
protection, and never entertained any doubt as 
to the rectitude of her moral character, even 
although the extraordinary letters which passed 
between her and the poet had been printed and 
published several years before. Her personal 
friends seemed to have entertained no thought 
of there being anything unworthy in her 
friendship with the poet, and those who were 
acquainted with her at a later period of her life 



164 Burns' Clarinda. 

held her in too high esteem, and judged her 
character too noble and kindly, to permit them 
to imagine for a moment that she had ever 
exceeded the bounds of discretion even in her 
admiration for her country's bard. 

That Clarinda truly loved Burns there seems 
no reason to doubt. Her own words, as we 
read them, impress that fact even on a casual 
reader. If we study her letters closely we can 
follow the progress of her sentiments through 
simple friendship, induced primarily for the poet 
who had won such extraordinary fame by the 
manner in which he had interpreted the hearts of 
his countrymen, until we find friendship develop 
into love, and then that love become so intense 
that it throws off all reserve and delights in 
acknowledgment. That Clarinda would have 
united her fortunes with those of the poet had 
the divorce machinery in the Scotch Courts been 
as easily worked then as now, seems reasonable 
to assume. But divorce was little thought of 
in Scotland in her day, and she could only bid 
him wait and hope, two qualities which seem to 
have been lacking in the poet's mental equip- 
ment. That she grieved when Burns by his 
open marriage with Jean Armour increased the 



The Real Clarinda. 165 

barriers between them is certain ; that she then 
abandoned all hope of being to him any more 
than a casual friend is equally certain. But it 
is true, too, that she never gave up her love, 
that time only deepened the impression he had 
made on her heart, and that the 6th of each 
December was always a sad anniversary for her, 
as on that date, to quote her own words, written 
many, many years after, she " parted with Burns 
in the year 1791, never more to meet in this 
world," and she added to the record the touching 
words, " Oh, may we meet in heaven." 

It is probable that in his whole career Burns 
met no woman who, to adapt the Duchess of 
Gordon's expression, carried him " off his feet " 
more completely than did Clarinda. This we 
say with full knowledge of the true wifely 
qualities of " Bonnie Jean," the mysterious 
passion for Highland Mary, and the undis- 
guised admiration which the poet so freely 
expressed for others of the " darling sex " in all 
ranks of life. Chambers rightly gives the reason 
for this when he says : " Mrs M'Lehose was 
exactly the kind of woman to fascinate Burns. 
She might indeed be described as the town-bred 
or lady analogue of the country maidens who 



1 66 Burns Clarinda. 

had exercised the greatest power over him in 
his earlier days." She had been unfortunate in 
her marriage, and moved in her own circle with 
the freedom which marriage, no matter how un- 
fortunate, bestowed upon women. Her husband 
had deserted her ; his conduct was little short 
of brutal ; and she evidently had done nothing 
to merit her misfortunes or to be placed in the 
dubious position of a wife who had been aban- 
doned by him to whom she had once given her 
heart, and who had sworn to protect her. Every 
one pitied her, no one had a word to say in 
defence of her husband, and as we read the 
entire history of the ill-assorted couple, now 
that the record is complete, we can regard him 
as nothing else than a base wretch, who passed 
through life, for some inscrutable reason, with- 
out receiving the punishment which his cruel 
and heartless conduct to his wife and children 
would have justified. Clarinda, in spite of the 
blandishments of the poet, and in spite, too, of 
her own evident infatuation, remained true to the 
vows she took upon herself when she became 
the wife of James M'Lehose until the end of her 
career. James M'Lehose, on the other hand, 
violated them all. He was regarded as a 



The Real Clarinda. 167 

" respectable " man until the close of his ignoble 
life, in 18 12. She was regarded soon after the 
publication of her correspondence with Burns 
with suspicion, and even till the present day the 
literary ghouls, who have tried to blacken the 
memory of " Scotia's darling poet," still affect to 
sneer at the conduct of a woman who in reality 
lived an honourable life, who devoted herself to 
her children, and whose almost last words were, 
" I go to Jesus." Surely, too, the ingenuity of 
evil conjecture might have spared the heroine 
who inspired that sweetest of songs, " My 
Nannie's Awa'." 

Burns was not attracted to Clarinda solely by 
her misfortunes. She was a beautiful woman, 
accomplished beyond most women in her station 
of life, sprightly in her manners, agreeable in 
her conversation, and possessing considerable 
poetic ability as well as excellent literary taste. 
If we were to judge of her relations with Burns 
by the code of morals which is presumed to 
prevail in our day, were her letters and his to be 
presented as proofs of wrongdoing under present 
conditions, they might, we freely admit, give 
rise to conjecture. But we must remember they 
were written in a time when people were more 



1 68 Burns' Clarinda. 

outspoken than now, when manners were not 
so strait-laced, when people talked more 
freely concerning many matters than they now 
dare to think of them. We should also re- 
member that Mrs M'Lehose, as a married 
woman, had no need of comporting herself with 
the reserve that would be natural in a spinster, 
that her disposition was inclined to be gay 
and happy, and her desire was to forget the sad 
position in which she was placed by her hus- 
band's selfish conduct. But, even before the 
Burns interlude in her career had reached much 
headway, she complained in a letter to the poet 
that the world regarded her natural inclination 
for gaiety with grave doubt. " In reading the 
account," she wrote, " you gave of your invete- 
rate turn for social pleasures, I smiled at its 
resemblance to my own. It is so great that I 
often think I had been a man but for some 
mistake of nature. If you saw me in a merry 
party you would suppose me only an enthusiast 
in fun ; but I now avoid parties. My spirits 
are sunk for days after ; and what is worse, 
there are sometimes dull or malicious souls who 
censure me loudly for what their sluggish nature 
cannot comprehend." 



The Real Clarinda. 169 

While, doubtless, Clarinda's beauty and 
sprightliness had much to do with attracting 
the fancy of Burns, it was her accomplish- 
ments, her sentiments, that really threw him at 
her feet. Except in religion, her views generally 
were more like those entertained by the poet 
than, so far as we know, were held by any other 
woman of his acquaintance, no matter in what 
rank. She was at least equal to the poet in her 
ability to converse on philosophical, social, or 
abstruse questions, and her conversation seems 
seldom to have been commonplace. She could 
be frivolous, but never insipid ; she could ap- 
preciate his varying moods; she knew enough 
of human nature to overlook his moral trans- 
gressions ; she had the same profound contempt 
for cant that he had, the same lack of apprecia- 
tion of rank for the sake of rank alone, the same 
ideas of human equality. There was nothing 
squeamish in her disposition. She met the poet 
on an equal footing, but never forgot, even when 
he held full possession of her heart, that there 
was a barrier between them which time alone 
had any chance of removing. 

Such sentiments as those indicated in the 
following lines must have went directly to the 



I/^O Burns^ Clarinda. 

heart of the poet as he read them in one of her 
impassioned letters : " A recontre to-day I will 
relate to you, because it will show you I have 
my own share of pride. I met with a sister of 
Lord Napier at the house of a friend with whom 
I sat between sermons. I knew who she was, 
but paid her no other marks of respect than I 
do to any gentlewoman. She eyed me with 
minute supercilious attention, never looking at 
me when I spoke, but even half interrupted me 
before I had done addressing the lady of the 
house. I felt my face glow with resentment, 
and consoled myself with the idea of being her 
superior in every respect but the accidental, 
trifling one of birth ! I was disgusted at the 
fawning deference the lady showed her ; and 
when she told me at the door that it was my 
Lord Napier's sister, I replied, * Is //, indeed ! 
by her ill-breeding I should have taken her for 
the daughter of some upstart tradesman.' " The 
following is another picture which, we may feel 
sure, impressed itself vividly on the imagination, 
as it undoubtedly must have fired the heart of 
the poet : " I'll tell you a pretty apt quotation 
I made to-day, warm from my heart. I met the 
Judges [Lords of Session] in the morning as I 



The Real Clarinda. 171 

went into the Parliament Square, among whom 

was Lord Dreghorn in his new robes of purple. 

He was my mother's cousin-german, the greatest 

honour he ever could claim ; but used me in a 

manner harsh beyond description at one of the 

darkest periods of my chequered life. I looked 

steadfastly at his sour face ; his eye met mine. 

I was a female, and therefore he stared ; but 

when he knew who it was he averted his eyes 

suddenly. Instantaneously these lines darted 

into my mind : — 

' Would you the purple should your limbs adorn, 
Go, wash the conscious blemish with a tear.' " 

Judging Clarinda by all the facts known of 
her career, she had three leading traits in her 
character — love, duty, religion. That she 
surrendered her early heart to him whose 
name she bore through her matronhood and 
old age seems clear enough. That when he 
forsook her, and she had abandoned all idea of 
ever again being to him anything but a memory, 
she yearned for some one to cling to, to love, 
is evident to any person who reads her letters. 
In one of them she freely says : " For many 
years have I sought for a male friend endowed 
with sentiments like yours ; one who could love 



172 Burns^ Ciarmda. 

me with tenderness, yet unmixed with selfish- 
ness ; who could be my friend, companion, 
protector, and who would die sooner than 
injure me." That she gave forth all the love 
in her nature to the poet is also evident ; every 
one of her letters is sufficient testimony to that, 
and also to the fact that her love developed and 
strengthened as the days passed on, and the two 
became more thoroughly acquainted with each 
other's brilliant qualities. But duty forbade her 
doing aught that might injure her fair reputation 
or cause her children, as they grew up, a tinge 
of shame. Her letters are invariably clear and 
emphatic on this point. In an early epistle she 
warns the poet : " I am your friend, Sylvander ; 
take care lest virtue demand even friendship as 
a sacrifice." Toward the close of the episode 
she wrote : " I believe our friendship will be 
lasting ; its basis has been similarity of tastes, 
feelings, and sentiments ; " and once she uttered 
the key-note of her own position in these words : 
" I laugh to myself at the recollection of your 
earnest asseverations as to being anti-platonic. 
Want of passions is not merit. Strong ones 
under the control of reason and religion — let 
these be our glor}/." 



The Real Clarinda. I73 

Her strong sense of duty, mingled with love, 
entered into all the other details of her life. 
To her children she was devoted, and her de- 
votion was inspired not merely by maternal 
instinct, but also by an elevated view of her 
moral obligations and accountability. This is 
sufficiently shown by the following words : " I 
have slept little these two nights. My child 
was uneasy, and that kept me awake watching 
him. Sylvander, if I have merit in anything, 
'tis in an unremitting attention to my two 
children ; but it cannot be denominated merit, 
since 'tis as much inclination as duty. A 
prudent woman (as the world goes) told me 
she was surprised I loved them, 'considering 
what a father they had.' I replied with acri- 
mony, I could not but love my children in any 
case ; but my having given them the misfortune 
of such a father endears them doubly to my heart. 
They are innocent ; they depend on me, and I 
feel this the most tender of all claims. While 
I live, my fondest attention shall be theirs." On 
a later occasion, when she accepted her rascally 
husband's overtures, and accepted his proposal 
to join him in Jamaica (a proposal which he 
never dreamed would be accepted), it was a 



174 Burns' Clarinda. 

sense of what was right that influenced her 
decision, not inclination or returning love. To 
her kinsman, Lord Craig, she wrote on this 
subject : " I have done what you desired me 
— weighed coolly (as coolly as a subject so 
interesting would permit) all I have to suffer 
or expect in either situation, and the result is 
my going to Jamaica. This appears to me the 
preferable choice ; it is surely the path of duty, 
and as such I may look for the blessing of God 
to attend my endeavours for happiness with him 
who was the husband of my choice and the 
father of my children." 

But religion was the foundation of this 
woman's entire conduct, of her walk and con- 
versation through life. She derived her fixed 
religious principles from the teachings of her 
mother — a clergyman's daughter — and in all the 
tribulations, humiliations, sorrows, and cares of 
her many years, she ever found in the applica- 
tion of these principles her firmest stay, her 
surest hope. Burns' want of fixed religious 
belief she deplored as the greatest of all imper- 
fections, the one that could not be overlooked ; 
and she lost no opportunity of making the poet 
think on " the theme of all themes," as some 



The Real Clarinda. 175 

one has expressed it. His apparent disregard of 
or unconcern about spiritual matters she appa- 
rently could not forget or forgive, although she 
thought little, as did most women of her time, 
of his social excesses and his unconcealed lapses 
into immorality. Some of her letters, indeed, are 
mainly devoted to the discussion of this subject. 
" Ah, my friend," she once wrote, " religion con- 
verts our heaviest misfortunes into blessings." 
Again she defines the fixity of her own belief 
and the want of any fixity in the religious 
sentiments of Burns in the following clear-cut 
words : "In most points we seem to agree ; 
only I found all my hopes of pardon and accept- 
ance with Heaven upon the merits of Christ's 
atonement — whereas you do upon a good life. 
You think ' it helps weel, at least' If anything 
we could do had been able to atone for the 
violation of God's Law, where was the need (I 
speak it with reverence) of such an astonishing 
Sacrifice? . . . Ah, my friend, 'tis pride that 
hinders us from embracing Jesus ! We would 
be our own saviour, and scorn to be indebted 
even to the * Son of the Most High.' But this is 
the only sure foundation of our hopes." Surely 
no one can say these words (and there are very 



176 Ewns' Clarhida. 

many like them scattered through her letters) 
could be expressed by a " flirting grass widow," 
a woman who did not possess in her heart that 
consciousness of rectitude of conduct and life 
which is the best human safeguard of virtue and 
honour. 

No one knew better than Clarinda did the 
weaknesses of her own character, and she was 
constantly on her guard lest these weaknesses 
might, in an unguarded moment, lead her from 
the ideal of womanly honesty which she had set 
up for herself. She was not unmindful of the 
danger of incurring censorious remarks, nor was 
she above the feminine dread of causing sus- 
picion by misjudged incidents in her daily life ; 
but, fully conscious of her own perfect innocence 
in thought, word, or deed, she did not always 
shrink from occasion for giving rise to remark 
as perhaps she ought to have done, and therein 
lies all that is to be condemned by any unpre- 
judiced mind, if any unprejudiced mind could 
condemn at all, in her relations with Robert 
Burns. Her love for him was real, but it was 
purely platonic, although she would during the 
time the incident lasted have hailed with plea- 
sure any lawful means by which Burns might 



The Real Clarinda. 177 

have changed the status of a friend for the 
dearer one of a husband. " If a confession of 
my warmest, tenderest friendship does not 
satisfy you, duty forbids Clarinda should do 
more," were the words she had written when the 
flame of love between them was at its brightest 
stage. So she had written at the beginning of 
the correspondence, and her sentiments con- 
tinued the same until the end. She conceived 
the idea that Burns and she were made for one 
another ; and as her hopes could not be accom- 
plished on earth she cherished the wish, long 
after he had been laid at rest in auld St 
Michael's Churchyard, that she would meet 
with him once more in another and a brighter 
world, a world where sorrow and separation 
are unknown. 

That Clarinda was a woman of superior in- 
tellect her correspondence sufficiently shows. 
Her letters, indeed, are brighter, more logical, 
and far more interesting than are those she 
received in exchange from the poet. They 
are natural, unpremeditated, and evidently the 
simple expressions of her heart's thoughts. 
Those of Burns, on the other hand, are so pain- 
fully artificial, so commonplace at one time, so 
M 



178 BiLrns' Clarinda. 

bombastic at another, and at all times so stilted 
in their style, so burdened with the effort to 
produce effect, that it is with difficulty we can 
keep the poet in our mind as we labour through 
them. It would seem as though he knew he 
was addressing a woman of superior intellect, 
and dropped his own natural self in an effort to 
present to her something particularly striking, 
something worthy of her exalted taste and 
sentiments — and failed. In his letters we find 
plenty of Sylvander, but very little of Robert 
Burns. 

That the poet loved Clarinda we do not 
doubt. That, had she permitted, he would have 
exceeded the bounds of friendship and pro- 
priety is only too evident. That he tired of 
waiting is also true, and that his love changed 
to feelings simply of friendship may also be 
allowed as fully demonstrated. When he left 
Edinburgh the spell of Jean Armour was again 
cast round him, and in his marriage to her he 
did what has redounded more to his credit as 
a man than anything else in his brilliant life. 
That he also loved Jean Armour is beyond 
question, but he was fitful and capricious, and 
wavered in his devotion. At these times other 



The Real Clarinda. 179 

women charmed his heart. Some of them had 
cause to " rue the day " they attracted the pass- 
ing attention of the gay, dark-eyed, lady-killing 
young farmer-poet, or filled a temporary void in 
his roving and wayward heart. Such certainly, 
from the evidence alone afforded by the letters, 
would have been the fate of Clarinda had she 
not been fortified and strengthened by the fixed 
religious sentiments which sustained her in so 
many trials, and by her elevated views of life 
and duty. 

A true wife, a warm-hearted friend, a good 
mother, a sincere, humble Christian, a philan- 
thropic spirit, a creature of generous impulses, 
Clarinda passed through her allotted years with 
hosts of friends who loved, honoured, and in the 
end revered her. Her life was wrecked almost 
when she entered upon its pleasures ; she had to 
dree a terrible, a weary weird ; but she never 
faltered or lost heart, even when the darkness 
gathered around her the deepest and the sea 
of fate moaned the most hopelessly. Who can 
blame her for valuing the friendship of that most 
lion-hearted yet most tender-hearted of poets, or 
censure her for, under the circumstances, freely 
acknowledging that her heart was his ? 



i8o Burns' Clarinda. 

And that was all. Everything seems to 
prove it, and the only detraction to her fair 
character comes from the surmises, the " ifs," 
the doubts, the contemptible insinuations and 
suspicions of a few literary vampires, who try 
to win notoriety or attention by their wanton 
liberties with the reputations of the dead. 



A Tribute. 

By Prof. John Stuart Blackie. 



At the house of an Edinburgh lady, Miss 
Nimmo, Burns had been introduced to a lady 
named M'Lehose, who being a spinner of verses 
herself, and of warm human sympathies, had 
naturally formed a desire to make a more 
intimate acquaintance with the acknowledged 
greatest master of the Scottish lyre. The meet- 
ing produced its natural result — a mutual recog- 
nition of social and intellectual kinship on both 
sides. The lady being of a frank and open 
character, and anxious to know something per- 
sonally of such an extraordinary genius whom 
in his works she passionately admired, invited 
the poet to visit her at her lodgings a few days 
after the meeting. Burns agreed, and was to 
have taken tea with her in her lodgings on the 
evening of Saturday, 8th December ; but the 
night before he was tumbled out of a cab by a 



1 82 Burns' Clarinda. 

drunken coachman, and got home painfully and 
with a severe bruise on his leg. The tea, of 
course, was suspended ; but a lively correspond- 
ence was immediately set agoing, in which, from 
the high-flown and rapturous style of the poet, 
the lady had instant occasion to remind him 
that she was a married woman with a living 
husband, and he must address her only as a 
friend — the fact being that she had the mis- 
fortune, at the early age of eighteen, to have 
been united to a worthless husband, a Glasgow 
merchant, she residing in Edinburgh while he 
was holding his establishment in Jamaica. 

But Burns was not a man to understand how 
friendship with a woman whom he greatly 
admired could be cultivated without passing 
into love ; and so the lady forthwith found her- 
self in the delicate position of being passionately 
admired by a man whose admiration she cor- 
dially returned, and that a man whose headlong 
impetuosity of temper was continually leading 
him to overstep those bounds which, in the 
intercourse of the sexes, are the shield of honour 
and the safeguard of innocence. Feeling her- 
self in this situation, it might have seemed wise 
in a lady of religious principle and virtuous 



A Tribute. 183 

habits — which Agnes M'Lehose essentially was 
— to have shut the door after the first interview 
with so perilous an acquaintance ; but her frank, 
unconventional nature combined with her pro- 
found respect for the poet to prevent this. 
Besides, she felt herself firmly fenced with the 
mail of a severe creed, and if she were able to 
maintain her own position, as she did nobly, 
she might also hope to use her moral influence 
effectively in restraining the passions and guid- 
ing the counsels of her admirer. The corre- 
spondence of these two remarkable persons, 
continued with little interruption for more than 
three months, is in the highest degree interest- 
ing, exhibiting perhaps even more strikingly, if 
not more classically, than his love songs the 
leading features in the character of this wonder- 
ful genius. Love and religion certainly never 
were so strangely tossed together as in those 
impassioned epistles. In the following letter, 
dated 21st December, after alluding to the 
strong terms in which the poet had expressed 
his admiration of her poetical talents, she goes 
on to say : " Take care, many a ' glorious ' 
woman has been undone by having her head 
turned. ' Know you ! ' I know you far better 



184 Burns' Clarinda. 

than you do me. Like yourself, I am a bit of 
an enthusiast. In religion and friendship quite 
a bigot — perhaps I could be so in love too, 
but everything dear to me in heaven and earth 
forbids ! This is my fixed principle, and the 
person who would dare to endeavour to remove 
it I would hold as my chief enemy. Like you, I 
am incapable of dissimulation ; nor am I, as you 
suppose, unhappy. I have been unfortunate ; 
but guilt alone could make me unhappy. Pos- 
sessed of fine children — competence — fame — 
friends, kind and attentive — what a monster of 
ingratitude should I be in the eye of Heaven 
were I to style myself unhappy ! True, I have 
met with scenes horrible to recollection — even 
at six years' distance ; but adversity, my friend, 
is allowed to be the school of virtue. It oft con- 
fers that chastened softness which is unknown 
among the favourites of fortune ! Even a mind 
possessed of natural sensibility, without this, 
never feels that exquisite pleasure which nature 
has annexed to our sympathetic sorrows. Reli- 
gion, the only refuge of the unfortunate, has 
been my balm in every woe. Oh ! could I make 
her appear to you as she has done to me ! 
Instead of ridiculing her tenets, you would fall 



A Tribute. 185 

down and worship her very semblance wherever 
you found it." 

Here, and in some other communications, she 
reveals herself as the most gracious and oppor- 
tune of preachers. Calvinism from such sweet 
lips would sound quite differently than when 
thundered from the throat of the Rev. Dr 
Auld, of Mauchline, or any of his condemnatory 
brethren of the Evangelical type. From her 
elevated point of view, unsoiled by the mire 
through which her correspondent had some- 
times dragged his eagle plumes, she saw clearly 
through his character, and interpreted the his- 
tory of his religious experiences and moral 
aberrations, with that keenness and sureness of 
glance which belong to the moral superiority of 
the interpreter : — " One thing alone hurt me, 
though I regretted many — your avowal of being 
an enemy to Calvinism. I guessed it was so by 
some of your pieces, but the confirmation of it 
gave me a shock I could only have felt for one 
I was interested in. You will not wonder at 
this, when I inform you that I am a strict 
Calvinist, one or two dark tenets excepted, 
which I never meddle with. Like many others, 
you are so either from never having examined it 



1 86 Burns' Clarinda. 

with candour and impartiality, or from having 
unfortunately met with weak professors who did 
not understand it, and hypocritical ones who 
made it a cloak for their knavery. Both of 
these, I am aware, abound in country life ; nor 
am I surprised at their having had this effect 
upon your more enlightened understanding. I 
fear your friend, the captain of the ship, was of 
no advantage to you in this and many other 
respects." 

These earnest appeals and serious warnings of 
the good lady had the valuable effect of drawing 
from the poet his confession of faith in a more 
complete form than we find it in any other part 
of his works. A Calvinist certainly Burns was 
not ; but though, like all emotional persons, 
repelled rather than attracted by the dogmas of a 
systematic theology, and though not infrequently 
seduced by his passions from his loyalty to his 
principles, he was by no means an irreligious 
man. . . . Our limited space forbids to enter 
more largely into these revelations from the 
inner soul of this man of large intelligence, 
noble aspirations, and ill - regulated passions. 
The more intimate relations with Mrs M'Lehose, 
or Clarinda, as she is poetically called, were 



A Tribute. 187 

abruptly broken off in March, when the poet 
left the metropolis for the scene of his early 
loves and rustic occupations in Ayrshire. . . . 
In the month of February 1792, Mrs 
M'Lehose, after due consideration of a pro- 
posal of reunion on the part of her husband, 
set sail from Leith to join him in Jamaica ; but 
she had not been long there before, from the 
continued unkindly conduct of her worthless 
mate, partly from the evil effects of the climate 
on her constitution, she was obliged to return to 
Edinburgh, where she lived and died at a ripe 
old age, beloved and respected by all who knew 
her. 



All About Clarinda. 

By Robert Ford, Author of " Thistledown," &c. &c. 
{From the '■'■ People^ s Friend,^'') 



To the question, " Who was Clarinda ? " there 
are few persons of mature growth in Scotland 
who would not glibly answer, " Mrs M'Lehose." 
And further to this the most elementary and 
superficial student of Scottish poetical literature 
could tell that she formed a conspicuous figure 
among the dozen or more women who at one 
time or another made havoc of the heart of the 
National Poet. The full and particular account 
of the sadly chequered and interesting career 
of Clarinda, however, who, according to Burns* 
own written statement, had "wit and wisdom 
more murderously fascinating than the stiletto 
of the Sicilian bandit or the poisoned arrow of 
the savage African," is common knowledge only 
to the curious, who are the few. A brief sketch 
of the lady's career, together with a bird's-eye 
review of the Clarinda-Sylvander correspond- 



All About Clarinda. 189 

ence, will therefore not be unwelcome here ; as 
nought can ever be unwelcome to Scottish 
readers which comes so near to the heart of 
Robert Burns as to treat of one whose grace 
and beauty and intellectual superiority evoked 
his unqualified admiration — one who loved him 
with her whole heart and soul, and was the 
heroine of at least two of the most vivid and 
tenderly passionate lyrics that came from his pen. 
I mean " Ae Fond Kiss " and '* My Nannie's 
Awa' " — the former a parting song in which the 
stanza occurs — 

" Had we never loved sae kindly, 
Had we never loved sae blindly, 
Never met — or never parted, 
We had ne'er been broken-hearted." 

Making four lines of which Sir Walter Scott has 
proudly remarked, " They contain the essence of 
a thousand love tales." 

Mrs M'Lehose, whose maiden name was 
Agnes Craig, was no ordinary person, and had 
no ordinary antecedents. She was grandniece 
by her mother's side of the house of Colin 
M'Laurin, the celebrated mathematician and 
friend of Sir Isaac Newton ; and he was brother 
of M'Laurin, the divine, at one time the minister 



IQO Burns' Clarinda. 

of Luss, on Lochlomondside, and latterly of St 
David's parish in Glasgow, whose sermon, 
" Glorying in the Cross of Christ," has been 
described as the most eloquent in the English 
language. The daughter of a Glasgow surgeon 
named Craig— a gentleman also of good family, 
which had its representatives on the judicial 
bench as well as in the pulpit — she was born 
here in April 1759 — the same year, be it noted, 
in which the song-celebrated " blast o' Jan'war' 
win' blew han'sel in on Robin " — Miss Craig, 
when only eight years old, had the misfortune 
to lose her mother. But she grew and prospered 
apace, and by the time she had reached her 
fifteenth birthday she was regarded as one of 
the beauties of the western capital, and had 
received the distinctive and complimentary title 
of " Pretty Miss Nancy." In her sixteenth year 
she was sent to an Edinburgh boarding-school 
to complete her education. But previous to this 
her beauty had attracted the attention of a Mr 
James M'Lehose, a law agent in Glasgow. Up 
to this time he had failed to obtain an introduc- 
tion to her ; but on learning that she was going 
to Edinburgh, he engaged all the seats on the 
stage-coach except the one which he studiously 



All About Clarinda. 191 

allowed to be taken for her. The opportunity 
thus secured of ingratiating himself in the favour 
of the handsome young damsel Mr M'Lehose 
took the utmost pains to improve, and being pos- 
sessed of an attractive person and most insinu- 
ating manners, by the time their forty miles' 
journey was completed he had made a very 
favourable impression on the young lady's mind. 
On her return to Glasgow, after an absence of 
six months, he resumed his suit, and pretty Miss 
Nancy Craig duly became Mrs M'Lehose in 
July 1776, being then little more than seventeen 
years old. The union was not a happy one, and 
when two children had been born to them a 
separation ensued. 

" Only a short time had elapsed," said Mrs 
M'Lehose, many years afterwards, "ere I per- 
ceived, with inexpressible regret, that our dis- 
positions, tempers, and sentiments were so 
totally different as to banish all hopes of happi- 
ness. Our disagreements rose to such a height, 
and my husband's treatment was so cruel, that 
it was thought advisable by my friends that a 
separation should take place, which accordingly 
followed in December 1780." 

Shortly afterwards the husband, who seems to 



192 Burns' Clarinda. 

have been in no way worthy of such an amiable 
and attractive wife, sailed for Jamaica in the 
West Indies, where he held latterly the post of 
chief clerk of the Court of Common Pleas, and 
died in March 1812. 

After the separation, Mrs M'Lehose, with her 
two children, returned to her father's house, 
where she remained till his death, which event 
occurred two years subsequently. She then 
took up her permanent residence in Edinburgh, 
and lived in comfortable enough circumstances 
on the proceeds of a life annuity judiciously 
invested in her behalf by her deceased parent. 
Here, though comparatively a stranger, we are 
told, her youth, beauty, and exemplary conduct, 
together with the story of her domestic misfor- 
tunes, procured her many valuable and interesting 
friends. 

In the closing months of the year 1787 the 
Scottish capital literally rang with the praises of 
the ploughman-poet. He was the local intel- 
lectual star of the period, and nightly claimed 
the admiration of all admirers. Everybody who 
was anybody was securing an introduction to 
him, and enjoying the luxury of an evening in 
his company in the house of one or other of the 



All About Clarinda. 193 

literary savants of the city. By the good offices 
of a mutual friend — Miss Nimmo — it was ar- 
ranged that Mrs M'Lehose should meet the 
poet. They accordingly met and spent an 
agreeable evening together, just as the poet was 
preparing to leave Edinburgh, and a mutual 
esteem — perhaps we should say admiration — 
instantly sprang up between them. A second 
meeting was arranged ; but in the interval 
Burns had an unlucky fall from a coach, which 
so bruised one of his knees that when the even- 
ing in question arrived he found himself unable 
to leave his room. This circumstance delayed 
his departure, and led to a correspondence — 
which each of the two parties began by signing 
the initials of their own names to their epistles — 
and, after the first few letters had passed, con- 
ducted as between " Sylvander" and " Clarinda," 
the first being the counterfeit signature of the 
poet, and the latter that of his fair innamorata. 
How much Burns was disappointed by not 
being able to keep his tryst is shown by his 
letter of the 8th December, wherein he wrote : 
" I never met with a person in my life whom I 
more anxiously wished to meet again than your- 
self To-night I was to have that very great 
N 



194 Burns' Clarinda. 

pleasure. I was intoxicated with the idea, and 
if I don't see you again I shall not rest in my 
grave for chagrin." Mrs M'Lehose's reply on 
the same date is : " You shall not leave town 
without seeing me, if I should come along with 
good Miss Nimmo, and call for you. I am 
determined to see you." As soon as Burns was 
sufficiently recovered from his accident he visited 
Clarinda at her own house, on Saturday, the 19th 
January, and the result of the meeting was the 
intensification of their mutual regard and es- 
teem. Indeed, it was now the utter intoxication 
of love between them, and the poet is ready to 
exclaim, " Clarinda, first of your sex ! if ever 
I am the veriest wretch on earth to forget you ! 
if ever your lovely image is effaced from my 
soul — 

' May I be lost, no eye to weep my end, 
And find no earth that's base enough to bury me.' " 

The awkwardness of their relationship, it is 
fair to state, was ever present to both. Clarinda 
warns her admirer again and again that he is 
corresponding with a married woman, and how 
imperative it is for the fair reputation of both 
that reason should govern all their words and 



All About Clarinda. 195 

actions ; from affairs of the heart she bytimes 
endeavours to engage the poet in concerns of 
the soul, but they are both hopelessly entangled 
in the meshes of Love's subtle net, and only the 
enforced departure of Burns from Edinburgh in 
the middle of February could make them " tear 
themselves asunder." 

They met only once afterwards, in 1791, but 
occasionally corresponded until within a short 
period of the poet's death, which occurred in 
July 1796. 

Burns has been blamed by several of his 
biographers for his connection with Clarinda in 
the face of his previous engagement with Jean 
Armour, while others have contended that he 
was justified in believing that his engagement 
with Jean had come to an end. All we know 
with certainty is, that soon after his return to 
the country, his differences with Jean Armour 
and her family were speedily made up, and Jean 
and he forthwith became man and wife. So far 
as Burns was affected by it, the subsequent 
events fairly proved that the Sylvander-Clarinda 
affair was only for the moment rapturous, and 
once out of his sight, Clarinda was soon very 
much out of his mind. With the lady, however, 



196 Burns' Clarinda. 

it was markedly different. She loved the poet 
with a burning and imperishable love — a love 
which did not fade when she knew of his mar- 
riage with another — a love which did not cease 
when she heard of his death. In one of her 
warm, beautiful, and undoubtedly sincere letters 
we find her saying : " Never were there two hearts 
formed so exactly alike as ours. Oh, let the 
scenes of Nature remind you of Clarinda ! In 
winter remember the dark shades of her fate ; 
in summer, the warmth of her friendship ; in 
autumn, her glowing wishes to bestow plenty on 
all ; and let spring animate you with hopes that 
your friend may yet surmount the wintry blasts 
of life, and revive to taste a springtime of happi- 
ness. At all events, Sylvander, the storms of life 
will quickly pass, and 'one unbounded spring 
encircle all.' Love there is not a crime. I 
charge you to meet me there. O God ! I must 
lay down my pen." In her private diary, written 
forty years after the date of her last interview 
with the poet, she has this entry : — " 6th Decem- 
ber 183 1, — This day I never can forget. Parted 
with Robert Burns in the year 1791, never more 
to meet in this world. Oh, may we meet in 
heaven ! " And Robert Chambers says : " I 



All About Clarinda. 197 

have heard Clarinda, at seventy-five, express 
the same hope to meet in another sphere the 
one heart that she had ever found herself able 
entirely to sympathise with, but which had been 
divided from her by such pitiless obstacles." 

Subsequent to Burns' death, editor after 
editor of the poet's complete works — including 
Currie and Cunningham — endeavoured to get 
hold of the entire correspondence herein referred 
to, but Mrs M'Lehose, long and oft, with stern 
resolution, refused to deliver up her replies for 
publication. Allan Cunningham, when pre- 
paring the last volumes of his edition of Burns, 
penned the lady a long and earnest request, in 
which he said : " Without the letters of Clarinda, 
the Works of Burns will be incomplete. I wish 
to publish them at the beginning of the eighth 
volume, with a short introduction, in which their 
scope and aim will be characterised. You will 
oblige me and delight your country by giving 
permission for this. I will do it with all due 
tenderness. I have a high respect for your 
character and talents, and wish you to reflect 
that the world will in time have a full command 
over the letters, and that ruder hands than mine 
will likely deal with them." But still she would 



IqB Burns' Clarinda. 

not be drawn, and many years had to elapse 
until the main bulk of the curious and interest- 
ing correspondence was laid bare to the public 
eye. Even now, it is only included in the more 
sumptuous and expensive of the recent editions 
of the poet's works, and in no single instance 
with so full an account of Clarinda and her 
relationship to Burns as is contained in this brief 
paper. 

Mrs M'Lehose died in 1843, having survived 
Burns by the long period of forty-five years. In 
the poet's time she lived with her two children 
in a tenement-house in General's Entry, Edin- 
burgh, the position of which is now occupied by 
one of the public schools of the city. It is due 
to her memory to state here that once at least in 
the course of her unfortunate grass-widowhood 
she evinced an inclination to rejoin her faithless 
husband, and with this purpose set sail with her 
children to Jamaica in the year 1792. On pre- 
senting herself there, however, Mr M'Lehose 
insisted upon her immediate return, on the 
ground that the climate would not agree with 
her, and she accordingly returned in the same 
ship that had taken her out. Latterly in Edin- 
burgh she lived in rather humble circumstances 



All About Clarinda. 199 

in a small flat in a house in Greenside. In 
the last days of her life she never wearied of 
telling the story of her flirtation with Burns, and 
when showing to her cronies his faded love- 
letters, it has been said "she would just greet 
like a bairn." 

Poor, loving, charming, trusting, witty, un- 
happy Clarinda ! She loved not wisely, but too 
well. 



Clarinda. 

By Rev. J. C. HiGGiNS, A.M., B.D. 



Agnes Craig was come of good family. 
Only a few months younger than Burns, then 
twenty -eight, she was clever, cultured, good- 
looking, and possessed of no mean literary and 
poetic gifts. At their very first meeting there 
sprang up a strong mutual attraction. To her 
the poet wrote, " Of all God's creatures I ever 
could approach in the beaten way of friendship, 
you struck me with the deepest, the strongest, 
the most permanent impression," which warm 
avowal Mrs M'Lehose in reply as warmly re- 
ciprocated. The evening of that day on which 
he was thrown from the coach he had arranged 
to spend at her house ; but being by his 
accident confined for a considerable time to 
his room, he began those remarkable com- 
munications which went on between them 
(sometimes at but a few hours' interval) for over 



Clarinda. 20 1 

three months. After a week or two they 
adopted towards each other the fanciful names 
Sylvander and Clarinda, and so they carried on 
a correspondence quite unique in the history of 
letter -writing. We further gather that after 
he was able to move about again, Burns paid 
Clarinda about a dozen visits before he left 
Edinburgh in the spring of 1788. Mrs M'Lehose 
lived until 1841, her eighty-third year, thus sur- 
viving Burns for forty-five years. After various 
ups and downs of fortune, she attained to better 
circumstances, and moved for many years in 
the best Edinburgh literary and social circles. 
Until her dying day she fondly cherished the 
memory of the poet — ''that great genius," as 
she refers to him in her diary, under date 
25th January 1813. Another entry, dated 
6th December 1831, was found: "This day I 
can never forget. Parted with Burns in 1791, 
never more to meet in this world. May we 
meet in heaven ! " Here we shall only add 
that, after a careful and candid study of this 
remarkable episode, we are able to believe that, 
though the position which Burns and Clarinda 
took up towards each other was, to say the 
least, a somewhat equivocal and dangerous 



202 Burns' Clarinda. 

one, it passed off free from actual moral stain. 
Clarinda's letters, being pervaded by an un- 
questionably earnest religious tone, drew from 
Burns sundry statements of his ideas on religion, 
of which we reproduce one passage in par- 
ticular : — 

" I am delighted, charming Clarinda, with 
your honest enthusiasm for religion. Those of 
either sex, but particularly the female, who are 
lukewarm in that most important of all things, 
* O my soul, come not thou into their secrets ! ' 
I feel myself deeply interested in your good 
opinion, and will lay before you the outlines of 
my belief He who is our Author and Preserver, 
and will one day be our Judge, must be (not 
for His sake in the way of duty, but from the 
native impulse of our hearts) the object of our 
reverential awe and grateful adoration. He is 
Almighty and All-bounteous, we are weak and 
dependent ; hence prayer and every other sort 
of devotion. He is not willing that any should 
perish, but that all should come to everlasting 
life ; otherwise He could not, in justice, condemn 
those who did not. A mind pervaded, actuated, 
and governed by purity, truth, and charity, 
though it does not merit heaven, yet is an 



Clarinda. 203 

absolute necessary pre-requisite, without which 
heaven can neither be obtained nor enjoyed ; 
and by Divine promise, such a mind shall never 
fail of attaining * everlasting life ' ; hence the 
impure, the deceiving, and the uncharitable ex- 
trude themselves from eternal bliss by their 
unfitness for enjoying it. The Supreme Being 
has put the immediate administration of all 
this, for wise and good ends known to Himself, 
into the hands of Jesus Christ— a great per- 
sonage, whose relation to Him we cannot com- 
prehend, but whose relation to us is a Guide 
and Saviour ; and who, except for our own 
obstinacy and misconduct, will bring us all, 
through various ways, and by various means, to 
bliss at last. These are my tenets, my lovely 
friend, which, I think, cannot be well disputed. 
My creed is pretty nearly expressed in the last 
clause of Jamie Deas's grace, an honest weaver 
in Ayrshire : ' Lord, grant that we may lead a 
gude life ! for a gude life mak's a gude end ; 
at least it helps weel ! ' " 

Side by side with his many rapturous out- 
pourings to Clarinda, we find letters containing 
perhaps the most terrible expressions of unrest 
and self-upbraiding which even he ever penned. 



204 Burns* Clarinda. 

On the 1 2th of December he wrote to Miss 
Chalmers : — 

" I am here under the care of a surgeon, with 
a bruised limb extended on a cushion ; and the 
tints of my mind vying with the livid horror 
preceding a midnight thunderstorm. A drunken 
coachman was the cause of the first, and incom- 
parably the lightest evil ; misfortune, bodily 
constitution, hell, and myself, have formed a 
* quadruple alliance ' to guarantee the other." 
Again a little later to the same lady : — 
" Now for that wayward, unfortunate thing, 
myself. I have broke measures with Creech, and 
last week I wrote him a frosty, keen letter. He 
replied in terms of chastisement, and promised 
me upon his honour that I should have the 
account on Monday ; but this is Tuesday, and 
yet I have not heard a word from him. God 
have mercy on me ! a poor, damned, incautious, 
duped, unfortunate fool ! The sport, the miser- 
able victim of rebellious pride, hypochondriac 
imagination, agonising sensibility, and bedlam 
passions ! I wish that I were dead, but I'm 
no like to die ! I had lately * a hair-breadth 
'scape in th' imminent deadly breach' of love, 
too. Thank my stars, I got off heart-whole. 



Clarinda. 205 

*waur fleyed than hurt.' I have this moment 
got a hint. I fear I am something like undone, 
but I hope for the best. Come, stubborn pride 
and unshrinking resolution, accompany me 
through this, to me, miserable world ! You 
must not desert me. Your friendship I think I 
can count on, though I should date my letters 
from a marching regiment. Early in life, and 
all my life, I reckoned on a recruiting drum as 
my forlorn hope. Seriously, though, life presents 
me with but a melancholy path; but my limb 
will soon be sound, and I shall struggle on." 
And on the 21st January to Mrs Dunlop : — 
"After six weeks' confinement, I am beginning 
to walk across the room. They have been six 
horrible weeks ; anguish and low spirits made 
me unfit to read, write, or think. I have a 
hundred times wished that one could resign 
life as an officer resigns a commission, for I 
would not take in any poor ignorant wretch by 
selling out. Lately I was a sixpenny private ; 
and, God knows, a miserable soldier enough ; 
now I march to the campaign a starving cadet : 
a little more conspicuously wretched. I am 
ashamed of all this; for though I do want 
bravery for the welfare of life, I could wish, like 



2o6 Burns' Clarinda. 

some other soldiers, to have as much fortitude 
or cunning as to dissemble or conceal my 
cowardice." 

A comparison of these passages with the 
contemporaneous Clarinda correspondence once 
more shows, in strong light, what tumultuous 
fiery elements combined to make up the great, 
impassioned nature of the Immortal Bard — " So 
miserably open," as he himself has put it, " to 
the incursions of a mischievous, light-armed, 
well-mounted banditti, under the banners of 
imagination, whim, caprice, and passion." 



A Brief Sketch 

By Principal Shairp. 



Just at the time when he met with his acci- 
dent, he had made the acquaintance of a certain 
Mrs M'Lehose, and acquaintance all at once 
became a violent attachment on both sides. 
This lady had been deserted by her husband, 
who had gone to the West Indies, leaving her 
in poverty and obscurity to bring up two young 
boys as best she might. We are told that she 
was " of a somewhat voluptuous style of beauty, 
of lively and easy manners, of a poetical fabric 
of mind, with some wit, and not too high a 
degree of refinement or delicacy — exactly the 
kind of woman to fascinate Burns." Fascinated 
he certainly was. On the 30th of December he 
writes : " Almighty love still reigns and revels 
in my bosom, and I am at this moment ready 
to hang myself for a young Edinburgh widow, 
who has wit and wisdom more murderously fatal 



2o8 Burns' Clarinda. 

than the assassinating stiletto of the Sicilian 
bandit, or the poisoned arrow of the savage 
African." For several months his visits to her 
house were frequent, his letters unremitting. 
The sentimental correspondence which they 
began, in which Burns addresses her as Clar- 
inda, assuming to himself the name of Syl- 
vander, has been published separately, and 
became notorious. Though this correspond- 
ence may contain, as Lockhart says, " passages 
of deep and noble feeling, which no one but 
Burns could have penned," it cannot be denied 
that it contains many more of such fustian, such 
extravagant bombast, as Burns or any man 
beyond twenty might well have been ashamed 
to write. One could wish that for the poet's 
sake this correspondence had never been pre- 
served. It is so humiliating to read this torrent 
of falsetto sentiment now, and to think that a 
man gifted like Burns should have poured it 
forth. How far his feelings towards Clarinda 
were sincere, or how far they were wrought 
up to amuse his vacancy by playing at love- 
making, it is hard to say. Blended with a 
profusion of forced compliments and unreal 
raptures, there are expressions in Burns' letters 



A Brief Sketch. 209 

which one cannot but believe that he meant in 
earnest at the moment when he wrote them. 
Clarinda, it would seem, must have regarded 
Burns as a man wholly disengaged, and have 
looked forward to the possible removal of Mr 
M'Lehose, and with him of the obstacle of a 
union with Burns. How far he may have 
really shared the same hopes it is impossible 
to say. We only know that he used again and 
again language of deepest devotion, vowing to 
" love Clarinda to death, through death, and 
for ever." 

While this correspondence between Sylvander 
and Clarinda was in its highest flight of rapture. 
Burns received, in January or February 1788, 
news from Mauchline which greatly agitated 
him. His renewed intercourse with Jean Armour 
had resulted in consequences which again stirred 
her father's indignation ; this time so power- 
fully, that he turned his daughter to the door. 
Burns provided a shelter for her under the roof 
of a friend ; but for a time he does not seem to 
have thought of doing more than this. Whether 
he regarded the original private marriage as 
entirely dissolved, and looked on himself as 
an unmarried man, does not quite appear. 
O 



2l6 Burns' Clarinda. 

Anyhow, he and Clarinda, who knew all that 
had passed with regard to Jean Armour, seem 
to have then thought that enough had been 
done for the seemingly discarded Mauchline 
damsel, and to have carried on their corre- 
spondence as rapturously as ever for fully 
another six weeks, until the 21st of March 
(1788). On that day Sylvander wrote to Clar- 
inda a final letter, pledging himself to everlast- 
ing love, and following it by a copy of verses 
beginning — 

" Fair empress of the poet's soul," 

presenting her at the same time with a pair of 
wine glasses as a parting gift. 

On the 24th of March he turned his back 
on Edinburgh, and never returned to it for 
more than a day's visit. 



Rev. Dr P. Hately Waddell's 
Views concerning Clarinda. 



It was on the occasion of his second visit to 
the capital, and some eight or nine months 
after the pubHcation of his new edition, that his 
introduction took place, at her own solicitation, 
to Mrs M'Lehose, the celebrated Clarinda, a 
woman of genius by inheritance, and of fashion 
to a certain extent by birth and education ; 
whose misfortunes excited his sympathy, and 
admiration affected his heart ; who exercised 
upon him for the moment an exceptional but 
seductive power, more dangerous and discredit- 
able to himself than anything that had yet 
occurred. In the lady herself there was frantic, 
hopeless passion, being still a wife, although 
practically widowed ; in Burns there was, to 
say the least of it, reprehensible acquiescence 
and collusion. All obstacles apart, he might 
have married Clarinda, of similar tastes, of 



212 Burns^ Clarinda. 

similar constitution, and of the same age with 
himself — and would certainly have repented 
afterwards : as matters then irrevocably stood, 
he only dallied with her affections, and with her 
own deliberate acquiescence so far mocked her. 
To investigate this strange and questionable 
relationship would imply an analysis that must 
carry us far beyond herself; for the extra- 
ordinary moral problem presented to us by 
the competing claims of Mary Campbell, Jean 
Armour, and Mrs M'Lehose, for supreme domina- 
tion in this man's soul within so short a period, 
is in fact the mystery that requires solution. 
It is as a matter of speculation, however, only, 
that it has engrossing interest now : for the 
death of the one, the repentance of the other, 
and the impossibility of success for the third, 
have solved it as a matter of history for us 
long ago. Mary Campbell, with her own rich 
freight of love and immortality, in the sea of 
hope, on the very poop of betrothal, sank and 
died — a loss that shall be gazetted for the 
world as that of an argosy ; Jean, the survivor 
of many a jeopardy and peril of her own 
creating, was acknowledged for wife at Mauch- 
line, but with as little ostentation as possible. 



Views Concerning Clarinda. 213 

having first had to brook her own shame ; and 
Mrs M'Lehose, after the distraction of such a 
desperate venture for the possession of such a 
man, had to console herself that nothing worse 
had befallen than her own inevitable disappoint- 
ment. These are the matters of fact, and were 
the final issues of the case, with pain, with 
difficulty, and not without social damage to the 
man himself, ultimately determined ; at which, 
by -and -by for a moment, we shall hereafter 
glance. But now, whilst his correspondence 
with Clarinda, newly begun, still progresses, 
and final separation, with seeming despair on 
both sides, is not quite inevitable, the cor- 
respondence itself, so remarkable in every way, 
is what directly claims our attention. 

That correspondence, the reader is probably 
aware, was never an acknowledged literary 
labour of Robert Burns — was conducted, in fact, 
both by himself and the lady under fictitious 
names ; and, for that reason alone, should never 
have been intruded on the world as theirs. 
Secrecy, and perhaps a sense of shame, were 
connected with it. Towards the end of the 
correspondence, which was long after he was a 
married man, this is manifest — her very name, 



214 Burns' Clarinda. 

according to his own explicit declaration, being 
still a mystery. It is not, however, to be re- 
gretted, in a psychological point of view, that 
such an extraordinary revelation has finally, 
even with indiscretion on the part of some, 
been authorised ; for it is in this correspondence 
that the very essence of his imago life, burnished 
like a sunbeam, but drenched in aconite, is 
really to be found. Beyond all mere fictitious 
imaginary love-correspondence in its vehemence, 
being prompted manifestly both by passion and 
by rivalry, and having conquest in both alike 
clearly in view, is this wonderful series of 
epistolary outpourings ; but distinguishable for 
ever from all genuine correspondence of love 
by the hardihood that flashes through every 
line. Through all imaginable disguises of 
Platonism, of theology, of moral respect, of 
sympathy, of deference, of friendship and con- 
cern for one another, the fever of eloquent 
expostulation and remonstrance and petulant 
entreaty rages, till both man and woman are 
overwhelmed and exhausted with their own 
theme. To be born of indubitable frenzy every 
hour, and maintained at its zenith for months, 
within the limits of propriety and reason, nay 



Views Concerning Clarinda. 215 

with the solemnest recognitions of religion 
itself, when appeals to the Deity were proper, 
scarcely any extant correspondence of the kind 
can be compared with the letters of Robert 
Burns to this woman ; and the secret of this 
is to be found unquestionably in the one source 
of rivalry, as much as in the other of love. His 
letters to other women on the same theme, 
and with the same object in view, might, no 
doubt, have been equally eloquent and pas- 
sionate, if other women had been able to reply ; 
which they never were, except with bewildered 
silence. It was Clarinda's own faculty of re- 
joinder that stimulated him to such efforts of 
eloquence ; and his own love of victory, con- 
joined with his belief in the possibility of 
dissolving adamant with words, that carried 
him ultimately beyond the veracities of his 
nature in such a perilous encounter. Alas ! 
for such unlicensed and seductive war. For 
his own credit and peace of mind it should have 
been honestly abandoned when the inevitable 
issue was foreseen ; and for her credit it should 
never have been renewed. But a man of his 
stamp once harnessed for competition with a 
woman, and furnished incessantly with artillery 



2i6 Burns Clarinda. 

by her own hand, was not likely to retire from 
the contest whilst a shaft in the quiver remained. 
For himself it was disastrous, and for her sor- 
rowful. No good could come of it. There 
were ominous shadows of disgrace for him in 
such equivocal sunshine, and mischief for them 
both in such dread purgatorial kissings of the 
soul. 

This absorbing, and it must again be ad- 
mitted, most questionable relationship, seems to 
date from the beginning of December 1787 — 
from the hour of their first introduction, in fact ; 
and may be traced by correspondence, with 
some slight interruptions and gradual diminu- 
tion of enthusiasm on his part, till 1793 ; dis- 
tinctly marked at its conclusion with anger, 
recrimination, and passionate regret. During 
the whole of the latter period misunderstanding 
prevails, for which the lady herself was un- 
questionably to blame ; and the correspondence 
of these years, apparently renewed by herself 
also, seems to be little more than a series of 
hopeless and fatiguing attempts to readjust a 
balance of respect for ever dislocated. But on 
a review of the whole, the difficulty to which 
we formerly adverted returns again — namely, 



Vietvs Concerning Clarinda, 217 

how to explain the mystery of a threefold love 
during so long a period in one man's soul ; 
for that Mary and Jean, the one in heaven 
and the other on earth, were still there is in- 
disputable ; and that Clarinda was there too, 
although with weakened sway, cannot be denied. 
The most exquisite lyrics to each of these three 
women are all to be found within this period — 
not fictitious poetry, but genuine effusions of 
the heart. All lower self-indulgence, disastrous 
and sorrowful, in which he sometimes com- 
promised his own dignity for the delight of 
others, we omit to account for here : this 
alone — this triple waltzing of the soul, purely 
spiritual with one among the clouds ; honest 
and affectionate with another on the cottage 
floor ; questionable, but real, with a third 
through the post-office — with holy memories, 
with living love, with half-guilty fiction in the 
name of love — was indeed the great enigma 
of his life, and altogether inexplicable on any 
ordinary psychological principles. Could there 
be any serious delinquency, any practical moral 
disloyalty here? Difficult it would be to be- 
lieve this ; still more difficult with some not 
to believe it — for sin will be imputed by a 



2i8 Burns' Clarinda. 

few, where there is no sin, who cannot imagine 
such amorous extravagance as a normal con- 
dition of the soul. Be it so ; then David, 
Solomon, Sappho, and Petrarch were all in 
similar condemnation. He goes along with 
these in the biographies of the world, and 
was not unconscious of his own resemblance 
to the greatest of them during these very 
hours. 



A Visit to Clarinda. 

{From " Old a7id New Edinburgh") 



General's Entry is, perhaps, now most in- 
timately associated with one of Burns' heroines, 
Mrs M^Lehose, the romantic Clarinda of the 
notorious correspondence, in which the poet 
figured as Sylvander. He was introduced to 
her in the house of a Miss Nimmo, on the 
first floor of an old tenement on the north 
side of Alison Square. A little parlour, a 
bedroom, and kitchen, according to Chambers, 
constituted the accommodation of Mrs Agi-^es 
M'Lehose, " now the residence of two, if not 
three, families in the extreme of humble life." 
In December 1787, Burns met at a tea party 
this lady, then a married woman of great 
beauty, about his own age, and who, with her 
two children, had been deserted by a worthless 
husband. She had wit, could use her pen 
had read " Werther " and his sorrows, was 



220 Burns* Clarinda. 

sociable and flirty, and possessed a voluptuous 
loveliness, if we may judge by the silhouette 
of her in Scott Douglas's edition of the poet's 
works. She and Burns took a fancy to each 
other on the instant. She invited him to tea, 
but he offered a visit instead. An accident 
confined him for about a month to his room, 
and this led to the famous Clarinda and 
Sylvander correspondence. At about the fifth 
or sixth exchange of their letters she wrote : 
It is really curious, so much fun passing 
between two persons who saw each other only 
once." During the few months of his fascina- 
tion for this fair one in General's Entry, Burns 
showed more of his real self, perhaps, than can 
be traced in other parts of his published cor- 
respondence. In his first letter to her after 
his marriage, he says, in reply to her senti- 
mental reproaches : " When you call over the 
scenes that have passed between us, you will 
survey the conduct of an honest man struggling 
successfully with temptations the most power- 
ful that ever beset humanity, and preserving 
untainted honour in situations where the 
severest virtue would have forgiven a fall." 
But had Clarinda been less accessible, she 



A Visit to Clarinda. 221 

might have discovered eventually that much 
of the poet's warmth was fanciful and melo- 
dramatic. From their correspondence it would 
appear that she was in expectation of Burns 
visiting her again in Alison Square in 1788. 
She was the cousin-german of Lord Craig, 
who, at his death in York Place in 181 3, left 
her an annuity, and thirty years after still 
found her living in Edinburgh. " She is now 
nearly eighty years of age, but enjoys excellent 
health," says Kay's editor in February 1837. 
" We found her sitting in the parlour, with 
some papers on the table. Her appearance at 
first betrayed a little of that languor and 
apathy which attend age and solitude ; but 
the moment she comprehended the object of 
our visit, her countenance — which even yet re- 
tains the lineaments of what Clarinda may be 
supposed to have been — became animated and 
intelligent. ' That,' said she, rising up, and 
pointing to an engraving over the mantelpiece, 
* is a likeness of my relative (Lord Craig), 
about whom you have been inquiring. He 
was the best friend I ever had.' After a little 
conversation about his lordship, she directed 
our attention to a picture of Burns by Hors- 



222 Burns' Clarinda. 

burgh, after Taylor. ' You will know who that 
is ; it was presented to me by Constable & 
Co., for having simply declared what I know 
to be true — that the likeness was good.' We 
spoke of the correspondence between the poet 
and Clarinda, at which she smiled, and plea- 
santly remarked on the great change which 
lapse of so many years had produced in her 
personal appearance. Indeed, any observation 
respecting Burns seemed to afford her pleasure. 
Having prolonged our intrusion to the limits 
of courtesy, and conversed on various topics, 
we took leave of the venerable lady, highly 
gratified by the interview. To see and talk 
with one whose name is so indissolubly as- 
sociated with the fame of Burns, and whose 
talents and virtues were so much esteemed by 
the bard — who has now (in 1837) been sleep- 
ing the sleep of death for upwards of forty 
years — may well give rise to feelings of no 
ordinary description. In youth Clarinda must 
have been about the middle size. 'Burns,' she 
said, * if living, would have been about her 
own age, probably a few months older.' " 



Clarinda in Old Age, 



When Burns revisited Edinburgh in 1787-88 
he lodged with William Cruikshank, a teacher 
of the High School, in a house on the south- 
west corner of St James Square, in the New 
Town, and his was the topmost or attic window 
in the gable looking towards the General Post- 
Office in Waterloo Place. Herefrom Burns 
wrote : "I am certain I saw you, Clarinda ; 
but you don't look to the proper story for a 
poet's lodgings — ' where speculation roosted 
near the sky.' I could almost have thrown 
myself over for very vexation. Why don't 
you look higher? It has spoiled my peace for 
the day. To be so near my charming Clarinda 
— to miss her look when it was searching for 
me ! . . . I am sure the soul is capable of 
disease, for mine has convulsed itself into an 
inflammatory fever." 

The window of Burns was pointed out to an 
enthusiastic pilgrim, one summer morning in 
1889, by an old resident of St James Square, to 
whom Clarinda had pointed it out herself. He 



224 Burns' Clarinda. 

remembered Clarinda (Mrs M'Lehose) in her 
old age, when she lived beneath his own father 
in a small flat at Greenside upon an insignificant 
annuity allowed her by her brother. She went 
once to her husband in Jamaica, but she did not 
leave the ship, as Mr M'Lehose insisted upon 
her immediate return on the ground that the 
climate would not agree with her. She was in 
very poor circumstances during her later years, 
but never wearied of telling the story of her 
flirtation with Burns. As the aged residenter 
remarked : " The auld donnert leddy body 
spoke o' her love for the poet jist like a bit 
hellicat lassie in her teens, and while exhibitin' 
to her cronies the faded letters from her Robbie 
she would just greet like a bairn. Puir auld 
creature, she never till the moment o' her death 
jaloused or dooted Robbie's professed love for 
her ; but, sir, you ken he was just makin' a fule 
o' her, as his letters amply show." 

Mrs M'Lehose, deserted by her husband, lived 
in Burns' time with two young children in 
General's Entry, which lay between the Potter- 
row and Bristo Street ; but no houses dating 
back to Clarinda's day stand within a stone's- 
throw of Clarinda's flat. 



The Original Portrait of Clarinda. 



The portrait of Clarinda, which Mr W. G. 
Roy, S.S.C., handed round for inspection at one 
of the Edinburgh Burns Club dinners, was the 
original picture which was specially drawn by 
the celebrated silhouettist, Miers, for Burns, and 
which was in the poet's possession at the time 
of his death. It latterly belonged to the late 
Mr James Gibson Craig, and was sold at the 
sale of his effects. It is now the property of 
Mr William Campbell of Cammo, and he has 
consented to its being preserved in the National 
Portrait Gallery, where it will be deposited 
through the Royal Scottish Academy. The 
presentation will take place shortly. The 
picture, which is in beautiful preservation, is 
very faithfully reproduced in Paterson's six- 
volume edition of the poet's works, edited by 
the late Mr Scott Douglas. The following are 
the letters which passed between Clarinda and 
the poet on the subject of the portrait :— 
P 



226 Burns' Clarinda. 

Thursday Noon, February 7, 1788. 
" I shall go to-morrow forenoon to Miers 
alone. What size do you want it about? O 
Sylvander, if you wish my peace, let friendship 
be the word between us. I tremble at more." 

Thursday Night, February 7, 1788. 
" I thank you for going to Miers. Urge him, 
for necessity calls, to have it done by the middle 
of next week. Wednesday the latest day. I 
want it for a breast-pin to wear next my heart. 
I propose to keep sacred set times to wander in 
the woods and wilds for meditation on you. 
Then, and only then, your lovely image shall be 
produced to the day, with a reverence akin to 
devotion." 



Clarinda and Sylvander. 

By Alexander Smith. 



This lady, who was possessed of no common 
beauty and intelligence, had been deserted by 
her husband, and was bringing up her children 
in somewhat narrow circumstances. They met 
at tea in the house of a common friend, and 
were pleased with each other's conversation. 
The second night after Burns was to have 
drunk tea by invitation at the house of Mrs 
M'Lehose, but having been upset the previous 
evening by a drunken coachman, and brought 
home with a knee severely bruised, he was 
obliged to forego that pleasure. He wrote the 
lady, giving the details of the accident, and ex- 
pressing regret that he was unable to leave his 
room. The lady, who was of a temperament 
generous and impulsive, replied at once, giving 
utterance to her regret, and making Burns a 
formal proffer of her sympathy and friendship. 



228 Burns' Clarinda. 

Burns was enraptured, and returned an answer 
after the following fashion : " I stretch a point, 
indeed, my dearest Madam, when I answer your 
card on the rack of my present agony. Your 
friendship, Madam ! By heavens ! I was never 
proud before. ... I swear solemnly (in all the 
terror of my former oath) to remember you in 
all the pride and warmth of friendship until — I 
cease to be ! To-morrow, and every day till I 
see you, you shall hear from me. Farewell ! 
May you enjoy a better night's repose than I 
am likely to have." The correspondence so 
rapturously opened, proceeded quite as raptur- 
ously. It was arranged that in the future Burns 
should sign himself Sylvander^ and the lady 
Clarinda. Each day gave rise to its epistle. 
Poems were interchanged. Sighs were wafted 
from St James Square to the Potterrow. 
Clarinda was a " gloriously amiable, fine 
woman," and Sylvander was her "devoted 
slave." Clarinda chid Sylvander tenderly for 
the warmth of his expressions. Sylvander was 
thrown into despair by the rebuke, but pro- 
tested that he was not to blame. Who could 
behold her superior charms, her fine intelligence, 
and not love? Who could love and be silent? 



Clarinda and Sylvander. 229 

Clarinda had strong Calvinistic leanings, and 
Sylvander, who could not pardon these things 
in Ayrshire clergymen, and was accustomed to 
call them by quite other names, was " delighted 
by her honest enthusiasm for religion." Clarinda 
was to be passing on a certain day through the 
Square in which Sylvander lived, and promised 
to favour him with a nod should she be so 
fortunate as to see him at his window, and 
wrote sorrowing, the day after, that she had 
been unable to discover his window. Sylvander 
was inconsolable. Not able to discover his 
window ! He could almost have thrown him- 
self over it for very vexation. His peace is 
spoiled for the day. He is sure the soul is 
capable of disease, for his has convulsed itself 
into an inflammatory fever, and so on. During 
this period of letter writing. Burns and Mrs 
M'Lehose had met several times in her own 
house, and on these occasions he had oppor- 
tunities of making her aware of his dismal 
prospects. The results of his renewed inter- 
course with Jean on his return to Ayrshire 
were now becoming apparent. This was com- 
municated to her along with other matters, and 
Mrs M'Lehose was all forgiveness, tempered 



230 Burns' Clarinda. 

with rebuke, and a desire for a more Calvinistic 
way of thinking on his part on religious subjects. 
That the affection of Burns for the lady was 
rooted in anything deeper than fancy, and a 
natural delight in intelligence and a pleasing 
manner, may be doubted. His Clarinda letters 
are artificial, and one suspects the rhetorician in 
the swelling sentences and the exaggerated senti- 
ment. With regard to Mrs M'Lehose there can 
be no mistake. Pier letters are far superior 
to Burns', being simple, natural, and with a 
pathetic cadence in some portions which has 
not yet lost the power to affect. She loved 
Burns, and hoped, if he would but wait till 
existing ties were broken, to be united to him. 
But Burns could not wait, the correspondence 
drooped, and a year saw all passion 

" die away, 
And fade into the light of common day " — 

the common day of Jean Armour, Ellisland, 
and the Excise. 



How I Lost the Opportunity of 
Meeting Burns' Clarinda. 

By Thomas C. Latto. 



One balmy afternoon in 1841 I was sauntering 
along the western slope of Calton Hill, Edin- 
burgh, with my old friend Captain Charles Gray, 
lately retired from an active service of six and 
thirty years in the Royal Marine Corps, a poet 
himself, and one of the most enthusiastic ad- 
mirers of Robert Burns that the Ayrshire 
ploughman ever had. The Captain, in his 
somewhat halting manner, for he had an im- 
pediment in his speech like Charles Lamb and 
Leigh Hunt, was never tired of discussing 
Robbie and his songs. Indeed, they formed 
the warp and woof of his conversation. Every- 
thing connected with Burns was grist to his mill. 

At that moment a lean, thin-cheeked, sallow- 
faced man passed us. " Ha ! " said the Captain, 
" a Yankee I'll be bound. There are unco few 
Scotsmen of that type." 



232 Burns' Clarinda. 

" Correctly diagnosed, Captain," was my reply; 
" a genuine down-easter beyond question, but 
you can never guess who he is. Why, that is 
a grandson of Burns' Clarinda, bearing the same 
name too, M'Lehose. He has been in town 
some months trying to get some business 
settled in the Court of Session. I see him in 
the Parliament House nearly every day." 

" Indeed," rejoined my friend, " that is some- 
what strange. I was just about to touch on 
that very subject. Do you see that white- 
gabled house in the Low Calton, glittering in 
the sunlight ? " 

" Yes ; I had observed it." 

"Well, within that house lives the far-famed 
Clarinda herself I visited her last week, and 
found her lively as ever, still worshipping the 
great poet's memory, and by no means dis- 
inclined to joke on the superlative devotion 
evinced towards herself in days of yore by the 
impassioned Sylvander. I have met her several 
times at the house of Robert Chambers, where 
she kept up the liveliest of talk with David 
Vedder, the host, and myself, and was quite 
the belle of the party." 

" But she must be much changed," I remarked, 



Lost Opportunity of Meeting Clarinda. 233 

" since the days when she proved so formidable 
a rival to Jeanie Armour." 

" Oh ! that of course. The features are now 
somewhat harsh and haggard, very different 
from the rather attractive silhouette hanging in 
her little parlour. I cannot promise that you 
would discern in her now any traces of her once 
remarkable grace and beauty, but her interesting 
talk would be ample compensation for loss of 
personal charm." 

" How I wish that I could see her," was my 
eager reply. 

" Nothing more easy. To-morrow, or say 
Saturday evening, if that would suit you 
better," said the Captain ; " and I shall be de- 
lighted to accompany and introduce you. She 
knows something of you already, and will be 
pleased to have a chat with you." 

But that Saturday's interview was fated never 
to come off. There are so many slips between 
the cup and the lip in this uncertain world, and 
one must not count on many opportunities of 
meeting when the party to be interviewed is 
turned of ninety. 

On Friday I read in the newspapers the 
announcement of her death. 



234 Burns' Clarinda. 

A week or two afterwards I attended with the 
Captain a sale in Hanover Street, at the Auction 
Mart of C. B. Tait & Co., where the precious 
letters of Sylvander to Clarinda, preserved by 
her with loving care for half a century, were, by 
order of the grandson, her heir, disposed of to 
the highest bidder. To me it seemed like 
desecration to stand and witness these inflated 
effusions of genius at its worst, enriched, how- 
ever, with various verses that had years ago 
"taken arles of immortality," dispersed in so 
summary a style. " Ae Fond Kiss and then 
we Sever," "My Nanny O," Agnes M'Lehose 
being the heroine of both lyrics, " The Queen o' 
Scots in Prison," going, going, gone for the few 
shillings that they would fetch. Alas for the 
poor widow's love-letters ! 

It may scarcely be worth while remarking 
that the casket in which the poor old lady had 
for so many years locked up these jealously 
guarded literary treasures was an oblong box 
about the length and depth of a fiddle-case, 
rounded on top, covered completely with a 
cheap, clay-coloured wall-paper, such as servant 
girls were wont to use in packing up their odds 
and ends when at Martinmas term contem- 



Lost Opportunity of Meeting Clarinda. 235 

plating migration from one farm - house to 
another. Such a "kist" as the sweet and 
guileless damsel portrayed by Willie Laidlaw 
in his delicious, imperishable song, " Lucy's 
Flittin'," represents as the receptacle in which 
the fair lassie rowed up her claes, not forgetting 
the bonnie blue ribbon that Jamie had given 
her for a keepsake and pledge of unchanging 
affection. 

Some years after the worthy Captain's 
lamented death I scribbled off the following 
doggerel sonnet, which recently turned up in 
overhauling my memorabilia. 

BURNS' CLARINDA. 

As on the western slope of Calton Hill 

Old Captain Gray and I had dimbed the stair, 

" See ! " said the veteran, " yon white cottage ; there 

Clarinda, Burns's goddess, Hngers still ; 

Still is she proud of that long-vanished time, 

When the great bard would to her bower repair, 

Fleech for a kiss from lips so ripe and rare, 

And read her samples of his new-made rhyme." 

" Oh, could I see her ! " was my muttered thought. 

" Why, yes, my boy — in very deed you may ; 

She'll like it ; for she smiled o'er what you wrote : 

To-morrow morning, or, say Saturday." 

But many a slip I've found this one beside ; 

We never met — on Friday eve she died. 



Burns and Clarinda. 

By the Rev. Arthur John Lockhart. 



I. 

She was sae bricht, she was sae fair, 

She was of a' the warl' sae dear, 
How could I choose but linger there, 

Wi' tranced e'e, an' charmed ear ! 
This is luve's morning-tide o' bliss, 

Wi' mony a meeting, heart to heart ; 
But, oh ! luve's anguish, it is this — 

To kiss ance mair, an' then depart ! 

She was sae bricht, she was sae braw, 

Wi' sic a grace her charms she bore, 
How could I bear to turn awa' 

An' look upon her face nae more ! 
Ah, we, wha did sae blindly luve ! 

Felt we nae madness in the thrill ? 
Our dream is o'er, — yet, while we wove 

The flowery band, we dream'd nae ill. 



Burns and Clarinda. 237 

She was sae bricht, she was sae fair ! 

Now she ayont the sea is gane, 
How can I seek the banks of Ayr, 

An' dwell wi' musin' thocht alane ! 
What solitude in ilka street ! 

How gloomy seems each ancient pile, 
Since fortune yields me not the licht, 

The gladness, o' her perfect smile ! 

She was sae bricht, she was sae fair ! 

Ah, how will haunted Doon appear. 
When simmer sweetens a' the air. 

An' a' her birds are singin' clear ? 
There must I sit me doun to sigh. 

As bitter memory comes again. 
While the heart's ghaists gae flittin' by. 

An' a' the past is changed to pain. 

She was sae bricht, she was sae fair ! 

Her kiss was sweeter than the wine : 
Now spare, ye win's, thou ocean, spare, 

The lovely form I dreamed was mine. 
'Neath ither stars, on ither shores. 

When she has crossed the ragin' sea, 
Ah, will the ane my soul adores 

Gie whiles a passin' thocht to me ? 



238 Burns' Clarinda, 

She was sae bricht, she was sae fair, 

And, oh, we lo'ed each ither weel ! 
My easy heart I'll blame nae mair, 

To lo'e her not it wad be steel. 
Dear city o' my early fame. 

An' my ill-fated luve, adieu ! 
I seek the fields whence erst I came. 

To toil, an' weep, an' dream o' you. 



II. 

Ah, must we sever? 

Ah, must we sever. 

Dearest, for ever. 
After the days we together have known ? 

Yet, let me yet bless thee, 

Clasp and caress thee. 
Ere thou wilt leave me to sorrow alone ! 

Soft be thy pillow. 

Far on the billow ; 
Bright be thy dreams while thou speedest away! 

Every wave charm thee, 

Never one harm thee. 
Cause thee commotion, or work thee delay. 



Burns and Clarinda. 239 

Others shall greet thee, 

Claim and entreat thee, 
Yield thee affection, and make thee a home : 

Thou may'st not ponder, 

Hearts truer and fonder, 
When dreams of the past o'er thy spirit may come. 

Ah ! should aught grieve thee. 

Wrong thee, deceive thee, 
When we asunder for ever are torn, 

Think of me, parted, 

Sunk, and sad-hearted, — 
Oh, but thou knowest how deeply I mourn ! 

Let one thought move thee, — 

Still do I love thee ! 
Think me not cold who am only distress'd : 

Come, if aught harm thee. 

Shake or alarm thee, — 
Fly like a bird to this sheltering breast ! 

Yet, why this yearning 

For thy returning 
Back to my arms, from that southern shore ! 

Passion beseeches. 

While my heart teaches 
That I, who have loved, shall behold thee no 
more. 



240 Burns' Clarinda. 

I have aspired, 

Dared and desired, — 
I have not striven for laurels in vain : 

Song Cometh, welling 

From my heart, telling 
All the sweet tale of our passionate pain. 

I took Scotia's lyre 

And lifted it higher ; 
Thou art its theme, and its glory shalt see. 

Past is its prime, now. 

Brief is its time, now, — 
Hush'd its wild music for ever will be. 

Here must we sever, 

Now, and for ever ! 
Sweet are the joys we together have known ; 

But, with the morrow, 

All shall be sorrow, 
Thou wilt be absent, and I shall be gone. 



The Poet's Immortal Wreath for 
Clarinda. 



Sylvander's Reply to Clarinda. 

When dear Clarinda, matchless fair, 
First struck Sylvander's raptured view, 

He gazed, he listened to despair, 
Alas ! 'twas all he dared to do. 

Love, from Clarinda's heavenly eyes, 
Transfixed his bosom thro' and thro' ; 

But still in Friendship's guarded guise, 
For more the demon feared to do. 

That heart, already more than lost, 
The imp beleaguer'd all perdue ; 

For frowning Honour kept his post. 
To meet that frown he shrunk to do. 

His pangs the Bard refused to own, 
Tho' half he wished Clarinda knew ; 

But Anguish wrung th' unweeting groan — 
Who blames what frantic Pain must do ? 
Q 



^42 Burns' Clarinda. 

That heart, where mostly follies blend, 
Was sternly still to Honour true : 

To prove Clarinda's fondest friend 
Was what a lover sure might do. 

The Muse his ready quill employed, 
No dearer bliss he could pursue ; 

That bliss Clarinda cold denied, — 

" Send word by Charles how you do ! " 

The chill behest disarmed his Muse, 
Till Passion all impatient grew : 

He wrote, and hinted for excuse, 

" 'Twas 'cause he'd nothing else to do." 

But by those hopes I have above ! 

And by those faults I dearly rue ! 
The deed, the boldest mark of love — 

For thee that deed I dare to do ! 

O could the Fates but name the price 

Would bless me with your charms and you! 

With frantic joy I'd pay it thrice. 
If human art and power could do ! 

Then take, Clarinda, friendship's hand, 
(Friendship, at least, I may avow ;) 

And lay no more your chill command, 
I'll write, whatever I've to do. 



The Poefs Immortal Wreath. 243 

To Clarinda, 
With a Present of a Pair of Drinking Glasses. 
Fair Empress of the Poet's soul, 

And Queen of Poetesses ; 
Clarinda, take this little boon, 
This humble pair of glasses ! 

And fill them high with generous juice, 

As generous as your mind ; 
And pledge me in the generous toast — 

" The whole of human kind ! " 

" To those who love us ! " — second fill ; 

But not to those whom we love ; 
Lest we love those who love not us ! — 

A third—" To thee and me, love ! " 

Clarinda. 
Clarinda, mistress of my soul. 

The measur'd time is run ! 
The wretch beneath the dreary Pole, 

So marks his latest sun. 

To what dark cave of frozen night 

Shall poor Sylvander hie ? 
Depriv'd of thee, his life and light, 

The sun of all his joy. 



244 Bmnis' Clarinda. 

We part, — but by these precious drops 
That fill thy lovely eyes ! 

No other light shall guide my steps 
Till thy bright beams arise. 

She, the fair sun of all her sex. 
Has blest my glorious day ; 

And shall a glimmering planet fix 
My worship to its ray ? 

To Clarinda. 

Before I saw Clarinda's face 
My heart was blythe and gay, 

Free as the wind, or feathcr'd race 
That hop from spray to spray. 

But now dejected I appear, 

Clarinda proves unkind ; 
I, sighing, drop the silent tear, 

But no relief can find. 

In plaintive notes my tale rehearses 
When I the fair have found ; 

On every tree appear my verses 
That to her praise resound. 

But she, ungrateful, shuns my sight. 
My faithful love disdains, 



The Poets Immortal Wreath. 245 

My vows and tears her scorn excite, 
Another happy reigns. 

Ah, though my looks betray, 

I envy your success, 
Yet love to friendship shall give way — 

I cannot wish it less. 



"I Burn, I Burn." 

" I BURN, I burn, as when thro' ripen'd corn 
By driving winds the crackling flames are borne," 
Now maddening, wild, I curse that fatal night ; 
Now bless the hour which charm'd my guilty 

sight. 
In vain the laws their feeble force oppose : 
Chain'd at his feet they groan. Love's vanquish'd 

foes : 
In vain religion meets my sinking eye ; 
I dare not combat — but I turn and fly ; 
Conscience in vain upbraids th' unhallow'd fire ; 
Love grasps his scorpions — stifled they expire ! 
Reason drops headlong from his sacred throne, 
Your dear idea reigns and reigns alone : 
Each thought intoxicated homage yields. 
And riots wanton in forbidden fields ! 



246 Burns' Clarinda. 

By all on high adoring mortals know ! 

By all the conscious villain fears below ! 

By your dear self ! — the last great oath I swear ; 

Nor life nor soul were ever half so dear ! 



Ae Fond Kiss. 

Ae fond kiss, and then we sever ; 
Ae fareweel, and then for ever ! 
Deep in heart- wrung tears I'll pledge thee, 
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee. 
Who shall say that fortune grieves him, 
While the Star of Hope she leaves him ? 
Me, nae cheerfu' twinkle lights me ; 
Dark despair around benights me. 

I'll ne'er blame my partial fancy, 
Naething could resist my Nancy ; 
And jto see her, was to love her ; 
Love but her, and love for ever. 
Had we never loved sae kindly, 
Had we never loved sae blindly. 
Never met or never parted, 
We had ne'er been broken-hearted. 

Fare thee weel, thou first and fairest ! 
Fare thee weel, thou best and dearest ! 



The Poefs Immortal Wreath. 247 

Thine be ilka joy and treasure, 

Peace, enjoyment, love, and pleasure ! 

Ae fond kiss, and then we sever, 

Ae fareweel, alas ! for ever ! 

Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee, 

Warring sighs and groans Til wage thee. 



The Dearest o' the Quorum. 

O May, thy morn was ne'er so sweet 
As the mirk night o' December, 

For sparkling was the rosy wine, 
And private was the chamber : 

And dear was she I darena name. 
But I will aye remember. 
And dear, &c. 

And here's to them that, like oursel', 
Can push about the jorum, 

And here's to them that wish us weel. 
May a' that's guid watch o'er them ; 

And here's to them we darena tell. 
The dearest of the quorum. 
And here's to, &c. 



248 Burns' Clarinda. 

Gloomy December. 

Ance mair I hail thee, thou gloomy December ! 

Ance mair I hail thee wi' sorrow and care ; 
Sad was the parting thou makes me remember, 

Parting wi' Nancy, oh, ne'er to meet mair ! 
Fond lovers' parting is sweet painful pleasure, 

Hope beaming mild on the soft parting hour ; 
But the dire feeling, oh, farewell for ever ! 

Is anguish unmingled and agony pure. 

Wild as the winter now tearing the forest. 

Till the last leaf o' the summer is flown ; 
Such is the tempest has shaken my bosom. 

Since my last hope and last comfort is gone. 
Still as I hail thee, thou gloomy December, 

Still shall I hail thee wi' sorrow and care ; 
For sad was the parting thou makes me re- 
member, — 

Parting wi' Nancy, oh, ne'er to meet mair ! 

My Nannie's Awa'. 

Now in her green mantle blythe Nature arrays. 
An' listens the lambkins that bleat o'er the 

braes. 
While birds warble welcome in ilka green shaw ; 
But to me it's delightless — my Nannie's awa'. 



The Poet's Iminortal Wreath. 249 

The snaw-drap an' primrose our woodlands 

adorn, 
An' violets bathe in the weet o' the morn ; 
They pain my sad bosom, sae sweetly they 

blaw, 
They mind me o' Nannie — an' Nannie's awa'. 

Thou lav'rock that springs frae the dews of the 

lawn, 
The shepherd to warn o' the gray-breaking dawn, 
An' thou mellow mavis that hails the night-fa', 
Give over for pity — my Nannie's awa'. 

Come, autumn, sae pensive, in yellow an' gray, 
An' soothe me wi' tidings o' nature's decay ; 
The dark, dreary winter, an' wild-driving snaw, 
Alane can delight me — now Nannie's awa'. 

My Lovely Nancy. 

Thine am I, my faithful fair, 

Thine, my lovely Nancy ; 
Every pulse along my veins. 

Every roving fancy. 

To thy bosom lay my heart. 
There to throb and languish : 

Though despair had wrung its core. 
That would heal its anguish. 
R 



250 Burns' Clarinda. 

Take away those rosy lips, 
Rich with balmy treasure : 

Turn away thine eyes of love, 
Lest I die with pleasure. 

What is life when wanting love ? 

Night without a morning : 
Love's the cloudless summer sun, 

Nature gay adorning. 



Printed at The Darien Press, Edinburghi 



